June 26, 2012 – A Talk with Dr. Michael Laitman - after editing
A Talk with Dr. Laitman
A NEW LIFE
Talk 22
heb_o_rav_2012-06-26_program_haim-hadashim_n22
Oren: Hello and thank you for joining us for a series of talks with Dr. Laitman. Hello Dr. Laitman.
Hello everyone.
Oren: Nitsa Mazoz is with us, a workshop moderator along with Orit Dolev, an educational psychologist and a couple and family therapist. This distinguished forum has convened here today for you, the viewers.
In this series of talks, we are trying to clarify how we can, in our daily life, create good relationships with people at home, work, wherever we are or live, in order to finally live happily; we deserve it.
The topic of our program today is couples' relationships. Each session, we will focus on a specific type of relations in the system of one's life, and the first type we thought of, which is closest to a person, is the relationship with one's spouse. We will start from the inside-out. This relationship is the closest, most intimate one. On future programs, we'll open it up to broader circles.
I would like Nitsa to briefly describe this system of a couple's relationship in general. After that, Orit will present us with scenes from life and with their help we will try to provide people with clear tools and practical instruction on how to build a good relationship.
Nitsa: I have several questions about couple relationships. It is one of the most important relationships for the individual. We know that nonetheless, at times we encounter many conflicts and impossible situations within that relationship. So first, perhaps briefly, what is the significance of this relationship? How does it affect the person himself? What makes this type of relationship so important to a person?
Nature. We are built in such a way that we cannot be one without the other. I am not talking about sex; I am talking about family, which are two completely different things. They are related, but not identical. We need to understand that people need family, unlike animals that meet and after a while separate. Their offspring also separate and usually don't even meet. The mother raises them for a year or two. The father leaves after a while altogether and after the mother leaves them, they don't meet anymore, the connection ends.
The connection ends very quickly in animals; it is only for a short period according to nature, we know that they come to mate only at a specific time, and then it ends. It goes according to the instincts existing in nature. Even between cubs and their mother, after a while, the connection ends. There are no preliminary, underlying memories, there's nothing. They left the nest and it's done with. A new life begins, so much so that the son can come to the mother a year later as a mate; it is truly like that, with no memory of what had taken place.
With people it isn't so, rather it continues from generation to generation, in life and after life, in death. This connection is maintained, the memory, the grandparents. Some people document centuries of their genealogy tree and take pride in it. It is a very intricate matter. Everyone belongs to a specific nation, family and so on. We see it on all different levels: one belongs to a particular gang, another to a particular soccer fan club, a particular nation. There are many connections we build specifically, because we need something inside to tie us together; that's the issue.
I remember getting off a ship with a cap of a certain team in New York, and suddenly a person approached and embraced me, and I didn't even know my hat had a team's logo on it. A kind of warmth, connection, something in common, is very important to people. It's just like people sometimes say "We are one family." That word and symbol are very important, there's a reason why people say "Ah, you're close, you're family." We trust these people more; we don't take a complete stranger into business, rather someone close and so on.
Being drawn to such a group, especially a natural group like family, where we are of the same blood, have mutual children, means that we actually share the same blood. It's very significant. We see that people are drawn to all sorts of connections, all the more so to a family relationship, which can't be cut, it's in nature. That is why it exists today, at least for a certain amount of time.
The question is why there is divorce in our time. That’s another topic. Some attribute it to our life span. Nowadays, we live eight-ninety years and we used to live thirty-forty years, so in that period, people didn’t have time to fight enough with each other, so they managed. Furthermore, the matter of assets, homes, lots of land that they would work on, would be handed down to their children. If I’m a cobbler, my son would also be a cobbler. Everything was constructed in a very basic way, on the ground regarding the profession. They would literally pass it on to the children.
Whereas these days, everything is so "up in the air" that we don’t pass anything on to our children. Everything is schools, then university, work, the child disconnects from home at a young age; he doesn’t need parents or receive anything from them; he does everything on his own. That is why the family is losing the glue that used to exist between husband and wife. If the children are always at home and there are ten-fifteen of them within fifteen-twenty years, the wife is constantly giving birth, so they have a constant connection between them. There are always babies, the older children take care of the little ones; it is all one big thing. They also used to live with their parents, aunts and grandparents.
These days, since everyone is so disconnected from each other, spouses also lack a sense of self. There are many factors here operating in favor of disconnecting couples. The children are not around, the parents don’t live near us, other relatives don’t either, so they don’t obligate us to live together. In the past, if a problem arose between the husband and wife, relatives and parents would immediately speak up about what to do or not and put them in their place on the spot, but today there’s no such thing. Parents have one or two children and after ten-fifteen years, there’s no sense of connection, the children have already grown up, not at home altogether and are so insolent that you don’t even want to see them. My wife also has all sorts of her own interests at work and I have my own and so on.
So of course the rate of divorce is so high, it’s no wonder, there are many reasons for that. All of them operate together in the direction that I have no need to be connected to my spouse. Even women want to get divorced. It used to be very rare; a woman was willing to suffer just for the sake of keeping the family together. These days, she feels herself responsible, independent, and doesn’t want to tolerate that lazy person who does nothing around the house; rather she has to serve him all the time, what for? There are nursing homes, hospitals, there’s everything, why does she need this? I know of such examples that fifty years ago couldn’t have even happened, whereas today it’s an ordinary thing.
How do we bring the family back to the correct connection? What advice can we give a husband and wife so they can live together? How do we educate them to develop a connection, that even without children or parents, and the environment isn’t so supportive, full of opposite examples, how will they not be able to cut the connection that we help them establish?
Orit: They won't want it.
They won't. They won't even be able to, it’s even more decisive, severe. What kind of connection could it be? First I would like to hear from you, so far is it okay or is there anything else to add?
Nitsa: I think that this is exactly the place we would like to work on, those tips and things that will show us how to build the connection correctly. We are able to understand the forces of separation, but what are the forces of connection? What can help us connect from where we are right now?
What do you say to a couple who comes to you in such a state?
Oren: Perhaps we should take an actual case. Before the program, we prepared all kinds of case descriptions and we will ask Orit who has rich experience with many couples to describe a case for us from her experience, exactly as the couples tell her.
As if you are the woman who comes and tells me. But who am I? The psychologist?
Oren: Yes. We will listen to her and you need to help her. But let’s first hear the case. Are you presenting the case from the man’s perspective or the woman’s? Because each time you can present the case from a different perspective.
Orit: This time I will present the case as a woman.
Oren: Okay.
Orit: I wanted to say that my husband truly doesn’t trust me; he doesn’t believe me about anything. I can understand that it is based on the fact that his parents got divorced in the past, but what he says, at least the part he’s willing to share is that his attitude is due to an incident that happened between us. The incident is that I told him I was going out to a work event with a few girlfriends. I didn’t tell him exactly what went on at the event, but later on, he found out that there were also men and dancing, and all kinds of things. Since then he doesn’t leave me alone, he bothers me, calls me all the time. He disturbs me during work hours, he’s simply hysterical, I can’t take it anymore, I don’t know what to do.
And do you want to get divorced?
Orit: If it gets to a point of no solution and he can’t calm himself down and continues distrusting me, not believing me, there's nothing I can do with him. I can’t continue living like this with such harassment.
But didn’t you yourself give him a reason for it, by not telling him everything? You didn’t make him a partner. Why did you give him a basis for suspicion?
Orit: What you're saying is true, but what happened was that we intended to go out only with the girls and suddenly someone brought her boyfriend and another one brought someone; it’s not something I knew about ahead of time. And yes, there was dancing and a party and I came home tired and simply forgot to get into all the details. I said it was nice and that summed up the story.
No, not on his part. I, as a man, can understand him that if you didn’t tell, it’s a bad sign.
Orit: But it wasn’t done in principle, it was totally natural.
That’s what you think. For him, particularly out of love, because he loves you and wants to live with a faithful woman who's his. There are men who feel this way, because it’s their property. It’s truly so, from man’s nature, too and you hurt him, at least that’s how he feels. You can say how you feel, but we are talking from his perspective, his emotions, and he truly feels that here is a kind of problem he can’t overcome.
Oren: Lack of trust?
Not just lack of trust, it could be betrayal. He depicts to himself all kinds of images that his wife is cheating on him. She went out, didn’t tell him anything and he can twist her story in such a way that if you heard it, you would say “Divorce her, what do you need to live with her for?” He can say, "she came home, she said very nicely that there’s a girls’ party, that they’re going alone to an indoor place, without men, they’re going to spend time at a work event or a birthday party," and suddenly he finds out that there was an event that seems dirty to him and he doesn’t want to approve of it.
On the one hand, he loves her and probably makes the connection with his family, the education he got at home, that family is an important thing and you don’t just get divorced. But on the other hand he can’t accept it. What should he do with such a wife? What would you recommend? He’s talking about his inner feeling.
Orit: But it could be that since his parents got divorced when he was still a boy and he experienced the divorce very harshly, he isn’t willing to understand me that I’m not like that at all.
It could be that his mother acted the same way, and it could be that he’s transferring that to you, thinking that now it's his turn to suffer, just as his father suffered, and so on. That’s even worse. You should have taken that into consideration, in everything in life.
Orit: So what should I do now?
It’s problematic. We, human beings, cannot erase the past.
Orit: Okay. So what now?
How can we reconcile this? How will you prove to him that you are loyal to him and didn’t cheat on him? How? Do you as a woman feel that you have some kind of approach or means?
As if to revert him back to a state where he is certain that nothing happened here. Because his suspicion is about betrayal. If it were just about dancing, he wouldn’t have made a big deal, but inside he feels there was betrayal. Especially since as a child, he may have gotten extremely hurt at home. His parents got divorced and moreover because of his mother. If it were because of his father, that would be one thing, which is somewhat accepted in our society, and it used to be more acceptable that the father does that. Yet the fact that it was the mother, so Mother betrayed the family, she betrayed him too, not only his father. She truly ruined his entire small world and now he sees that it is happening to him. That’s a very difficult thing to cope with.
Orit: First of all in this specific case, of his parents, it was actually the father who betrayed and the mother was the one who broke into pieces. He was actually the one who supported and accompanied his mother in her sorrow. But in our case, he doesn’t have much to fear; rather he is actually saying that it seems to be a beginning of something that could get worse. But I don’t know how to stop it.
Is he certain that it was nothing?
Orit: He’s certain nothing happened, he believes me that nothing happened, but he is still so fearful that he’s constantly engaged in just thinking about it and when the next time will be, and he won’t allow us to move forward. I want to forget it and move on.
No. You can’t forget about it. You mustn't forget about it. If you want to forget you are disrespecting all of his feelings. How will you ever get along? How do you allow yourself to forget if he’s suffering? On the contrary, you have to show him how much you are suffering with him, that you are sincerely sorry you gave him the opportunity, something to be suspicious of. You must bring yourself down to his feeling and be with him and pull both of you out. You have to be genuinely immersed in it together with him, only in such a way. When he feels you are proceeding together, say if you had stolen something, and now you are very sorry about the theft and doing everything in order for it not to happen again.
You already know that you can’t believe your girlfriends. That next time it happens you are going only if it’s certain, either there will only be girls or you are going with your husband, and you show it to him in all situations. You call him before he calls you, you invite him to dinner, you say “Let’s go to the cinema, let’s go somewhere together.” You want to show him that you want to fill every free moment with him. That he will fill everything for you. That there’s nothing more in your life other than necessary work, not that you enjoy it there but it’s necessary, and all the other pleasures is only from him. You breathe through him.
Orit: Can’t it lead to a bad situation?
It will lead to a very good situation. You will finally reconcile and truly feel that you have a loving husband who strongly holds the family together. That’s a great asset these days.
Orit: He’s not going to take advantage of it and turn it into some kind of exploitation?
I don’t think that will happen. It depends; you are sensitive enough to see if it becomes exploitation. Here you will need to turn your relationship to being more like friends. You spend time together, do everything together, like two friends.
Oren: What do you mean?
Friends mean “equals.” That one doesn’t ride the other. With a husband and wife, sometimes it’s one way or the other, one of them is always more and the other less, it works like the shape of eights. If they bring into these eights the matter of equality, it works out. I recommend going for the matter of equality, going out of the house for a walk, even around the block and hold hands. Try. It’s not that simple.
Nitsa: Do you feel that you understand what you need to do now?
Orit: Yes, it seems quite clear to me.
Nitza: What are you going to do?
Orit: Maximum attention and treatment; most of my free time will be focused on being with him and giving him the feeling that in truth, only he’s important and the main thing is that he fills my free time. Because after all, I have other girlfriends and I have family, but to all these places I will have to take into account that I go only with him and he accompanies me and that way it can all work out.
Why shouldn’t it be like that?
Orit: Perhaps it should be that way, but in most cases of what is happening here in Israel in general, then the amount of divorces is only increasing.
If you want to be like most cases, there’s no point continuing altogether and beginning to fix anything.
Orit: Right.
That’s clear.
Nitsa: I asked her, because it was important for me to understand that she, as a woman who comes with a situation, totally understands how to implement it the moment she leaves here; that was important for me to understand. Is it clear to you or do you feel that you need additional tools to change the situation was described here, how to implement it, in practicality at home facing your husband?
Orit: I think that we spoke of the ways to take care of my husband’s anxious fearful place, and I think I have tools.
You don’t need to bend over backwards; you simply need to be a warm and loving friend, his wife, meaning to be on good, warm relations; he needs to feel it. It’s not some kind of diplomacy and the number of yes or no. That is why I think that if he feels it's coming from the heart it will work; if it doesn’t come from the heart, then you have calculations and it get even worse. He won’t be able to take it. He’s the type of man who will not tolerate artificial behavior, or some kind of relationship which isn't wholehearted.
Orit: What can you advise him to do? Now I know what I need to do. What can he do in order to help himself and us to fix the relationship?
He needs to give it a chance. From his perspective I say a chance because he’s suspicious of everything. He needs to allow for a chance of fixing these things and truly reach a state where everything is erased.
Orit: So if he says he'll give it a chance and he's willing to trust me, does he have to let go of his fear?
No. Not at all.
Orit: So what does he have to do?
He doesn’t have to do anything. He just gives it a chance. He’s willing to proceed with you together.
Orit: What does it mean “to give it a chance?”
To give it a chance means to build a good relationship from which he will feel a certain faith. Perhaps he’s a type of person, a type of man who doesn’t have faith in women, who constantly wants her to be next to him. There are such men. You know your husband better than I do, but if he’s that type, it won't help because it’s a natural tendency. There are very possessive men who are incapable of it.
Orit: So is it possible to help him fix that feeling?
No, he doesn’t have to fix anything. There’s nothing to fix here. It’s not a flaw; it’s nature.
Orit: But it’s hard for me to live with it.
Why didn’t you think about it beforehand? I’m sorry. How can it be brought up now? How long have you been married?
Orit: Ten years.
So you'll suffer for several more decades.
Orit: And then?
I have nothing to say, these are the fundamentals of nature, and a man’s nature is to feel that his wife belongs to him, which we get from the animate degree to the speaking degree. Men are unable to accept it. These days, the generation is flawed and all kinds of upside-down things are happening, but usually a man wants his wife to belong to him, in some way. Who is he to you?
Orit: My husband (In Hebrew the word for husband literally means my owner)
Your husband/owner. Do you hear what you are saying? That means there’s something to it.
Orit: Ownership.
Yes.
Orit: And what if I’m an independent woman?
These days, in our society you can be free.
Orit: Can’t there be an independent woman with a man?
If he allows it, because a partnership is when two people agree. We change throughout life. It could be that as a young married couple, it was okay, you'd agree to it, as would he, but over the years, we get older, after all and the memories from our mother’s house emerge. We become more like our parents and the environment has its influence; nothing can be done about it.
Oren: I would like to ask regarding the advice you are giving to the man. You’re saying that the man should give it a chance. Before that, you described in a very emotional way which I greatly identified with how hurt he is by this entire incident.
She’s also giving it a chance. They both agree, because he’s not leaving, rather he’s in the same state, hurt, suspicious and suffering.
Oren: Suppose I’m that man, I’m now trying to clothe myself in him; as you said, I’m hurt, suffering and anxious. Now I hear this advice “You’re a smart man, give it a chance.” I understand what you’re saying, I even accept it in my mind and your advice seems logical, but how do I truly open the heart to give a chance here, for indeed I am hurt?
That is why I told her that he doesn’t give up anything here.
Oren: Supposing I’m that man, what do I need to do? Direct me.
Nothing. She needs to do it.
Oren: We understood that. You gave her guidance.
She needs to call from home, take him to the movies, to a cafe, to assure him in all kinds of actions of caring for their relationship and him, because there’s no demand of him, since he didn’t hurt or damage anything here. She needs to show him that she is genuinely devoted to him and the family one hundred percent.
Oren: What is this chance you wanted me as her husband to give in order for this process to succeed? What does it mean that I have to give it a chance?
That the husband agrees to it. He goes along with her, participates in it.
Oren: Even though it's still difficult in the heart?
In the heart it isn’t difficult for him to participate with her together, to go spend time with her, to take a walk, but he can’t do anything with his heart. Rather, each time after these actions the hearts will be drawn closer and then gradually, the heart will calm down and it will sink into the heart. He will realize that he has a faithful wife, and for him that is what's most important. Some don’t care. Each man with his own personality.
Orit: But I, as his wife, in truth, didn’t do anything that is so bad.
I don’t know.
Orit: A lot of people go out to parties and events; he also attends such things from his work.
I don’t know. If I were your husband and heard that you were at a party with dancing, men, women, in my mind I would imagine the dirtiest things that could be at parties today.
Orit: So you didn’t trust me from the start.
No, I trusted you according to your own words saying it was a girls’ party. All of a sudden I hear that there was an orgy there. In my eyes, that's the way it is. What is there to discuss here? So I already think that you didn’t tell me ahead of time because otherwise I wouldn’t have allowed you to go, so you lied to me and went there. If I did, why didn’t you take me with you?
Orit: So, if that's the way it is and that’s what you think, then you didn’t trust me to begin with.
No, in these things I don’t have trust. If you lied to me about it, I already don't believe whatever took place there.
Orit: But I don’t see it as a lie.
You can see it as you wish, but for me it is a flaw in my heart, that’s it, I have a scratch on my heart, what are you going to do?
Orit: So I have to understand you and be in the place of helping you.
Because you’re the guilty one here and not me, you performed the action. It doesn't matter even if it's the best action, but you performed it. You started it with a girls’ party and ended it with dancing with men and you came home late, drunk. When I see these things, I’m not just hurt, rather I feel that my family isn’t a family anymore, everything is broken, the faithful wife I had isn’t faithful anymore, she’s a liar and a cheat. What can I do? I don’t know how he even remains at home.
Orit: But I’m not his father and I didn’t betray him, I went to a party where things happened. He brings it from his home.
If you are telling me that's how you feel up to this moment and don’t understand how I feel, there’s nothing to do between us.
Orit: I understand how you feel; I want to know about how much both sides need to put in.
None from my side. From my point of view, you ruined the family and life and everything, we have nothing in common. Suppose we have children together, that can be examined too, because I already don’t believe in you about the past either, about anything. Regarding the future, how can I live with such a betraying woman?
Orit: Wait, we will get to the betrayal. It’s not betrayal, it’s loyalty, but we’ll get to the betrayal.
I see it that way. There are men who are willing to reconcile; there are families where the woman goes out at night in one direction and the man in the other. There are men who are incapable of imagining their wife smiling at anyone else. There are different types of men. So you need to know who your husband is.
Orit: This is something that one truly needs to know in advance who they are marrying and perhaps actually work on it throughout the entire relationship, so that such extreme situations don't come up.
I don’t understand how he married you.
Orit: He didn’t have any reason to suspect anything.
At the time, there probably wasn't anything to be suspicious of.
Orit: No, I come from a family that is totally fine.
It has nothing to do with the family.
Orit: He had no reason to suspect anything. Meaning, today he also has no reason to suspect anything, as far as I’m concerned. I mean, I still think that it’s a difficulty coming from his childhood home, but am willing to go along with his painful place.
That's a different question. You have been living with him for ten years, a modern, normal family. If, before this happened, you would have heard that one of your girlfriends did it to her husband and now there’s a problem between them, how would you accept it, with understanding or not? Or perhaps you cannot clothe yourself in the man at all.
Orit: I am capable of that.
Would you justify him or not? I’m talking about that party you had.
Orit: I would justify him, not with the same intensity that it’s being perceived. I would demand that the intensity subside, because there’s also the other side, and one needs to learn to trust the other over ten years.
Why didn’t you call him in the middle of the party? Why didn’t you leave when you saw that the party was with men?
Orit: Because I didn’t dance, I sat on the side with a friend and chatted with her. I didn’t dance and didn’t do anything that he should be suspicious of. But, in truth, I didn’t think it could be so acute, because I’m me, I know who I am.
Did he ask you about this party and its whereabouts?
Orit: He knew where it was.
Was it a public or private place?
Orit: A public place. It was closed for the company event and only women were supposed to come. One of them, whose boyfriend had a problem, brought him, and they brought a few more. In short, I didn't participate in that story; I sat with a friend and talked. So again, the question is about the intensity.
So I’m asking something else now. Why don’t you make this event happen again and take him with you? Or something smaller, but for there to be those people who will give him the feeling that everything isn’t dirty as he imagines, rather something cleaner?
Orit: That’s an idea. I hadn't thought of it. It is certainly a good idea.
First of all I’m now hearing that it’s from work, that it was in a public place which was closed particularly for this party. They can tell him and explain it to him, it might help.
Oren: I would like to ask about some advice you gave before. You said that you recommend couples in such a situation to force themselves to go out for a walk holding hands.
Holding hands is very symbolic. It means that we are “equal." Walking holding hands. Holding hands is not that the woman is holding the man, rather both are walking together. It’s very important. Actually walk to the park holding hands. Truly holding hands, not next to each other, not embracing or anything else, but hand in hand. It gives a feeling of equality.
Oren: During this walk holding hands, the emotional state between them isn’t so great, as we understand from this current situation. What do you recommend? Do you recommend they talk about anything? If so, what about? Other than walking holding hands, what needs to happen, should they talk about anything?
I recommend talking about the children or grandchildren, it can happen at any age.
Oren: About the things they have in common?
Yes, about things they have in common, about distant people, from childhood perhaps, something that doesn’t belong to them, actually, not in the inner circle of the family, unless they’re speaking about children. It should be regarding something that won’t have us ruin anything, something that will arouse our relationship on the positive side. Even if we discuss problems a little, then only a little; it has to bring us to cooperation between us. The goal is to arouse cooperation. So what can arouse cooperation here, but only cooperation? I am taking that from my own experience of taking a walk with my wife for an hour every day. Only good news.
Oren: But now we are talking about taking a walk in a specific situation.
Even more so.
Oren: That’s why I’m asking, what should they talk about, in such a complex situation, supposing they were able to find the inner strength to take a walk holding hands.
It's not like that. She has to come to him and say she'd like to take a walk.
Oren: And he has to give it a chance, as you said before.
Without a chance, without anything, we’re not going to talk about chances and conditions. Just take a walk, let’s walk around.
Oren: They’re on the street.
Yes, they’re on the street. She should take him by his hand, or even his arm, it doesn’t matter at the start. They should speak about everything they have in common, which doesn’t arouse antagonism, opposition. Rather, for it to draw them closer.
Orit: About future plans as well, about things for the future?
I wouldn’t arouse future plans; that already means you are obligating a relationship, as if you want to make him promise that there’s a future.
I would awaken the past in a calm, nice, quiet way and that’s all. What has he been asking of you for many years and didn’t get? Perhaps to go to his mother's, maybe something else, there are such things. It could be to go somewhere to rest together or do something. You need to remember something now and use it.
Orit: Good memories.
Oren: Not only memories, desires you haven’t fulfilled.
That you haven't implemented.
Orit: Exactly, desires that I haven't implemented.
But not to do it as if: “Now I’m guilty, I’m ready.”
Oren: Then how?
It has to be done gently, simply by the way.
Orit: So it isn’t transparent.
No, for sure.
Nitsa: Meaning so it won’t seem like some kind of pleasing.
No, but the best is that he needs to know everything about the party and whoever was there. You have to make it happen. When it's your birthday or his or whatever, invite some of those who were there and it will already neutralize the suspicion.
Oren: You said before that there are men who don’t trust women by nature and there are men who do. It’s probably some kind of a scale between zero to a hundred. Suppose a couple got married and didn’t really notice it before, like me, for example, I'm the type of man who doesn’t trust and I am in a relationship, what can you advise me and my wife, knowing the nature of man and from the feeling of this couple's situation? Because we are already together and even have kids and if the man is more or less one of those whose nature isn’t trusting, it makes life quite difficult.
I know, the same thing happened with my daughter. She thought of marrying a guy and she had a business trip. He told her: “If you are marrying me, how come you’re already going abroad?” She said “What can I do, it’s my job and I have to.” It turned out that this is a man with such a tendency and I recommended that she not marry him. Or else she needs to choose; it could be that for her, life means to be at home, or also work, but close by. Meaning, it depends how much one lets go of the rope.
Oren: But that’s when it can be decided whether to enter a connection of marriage or not. Let's say we are already married and have children and that is not a package that you rush to take apart. The situation is such that he isn't very trusting and the wife suffers a great deal, and they’re coming to listen to some advice. They’re already in it; the advice of “you shouldn’t have gotten into this” doesn’t help them. From being stuck like this, is there anything, any approach, a point of view, anything to slightly relieve the situation?
To make it easy for the man is only by being near him as a faithful and true partner.
Orit: Again it’s the role of the woman.
That’s the role of the woman.
Orit: But what is the man’s role?
The man’s role, there’s no role here, I’m saying in all seriousness. That’s their nature, for the man will always feel he’s compromising and won’t accept it. It will be expressed as pressure, anger, beating, never mind how, there are men who are incapable of it. I was present in a situation with a couple, in a big fancy restaurant I was invited to, and suddenly I see a man, the husband, get up and walk over to the nearby table and yell at someone “Why did you do so to my wife?” I immediately realized that it was a slightly sick incident. He was also an older man, 50 years old or older, and so was the couple. The atmosphere in the restaurant had been very congenial. It’s as simple as that, some outburst. I think this couple had been together for thirty years. I saw it with my own eyes, how it suddenly bursts in a sick way, and you can’t say anything about it, because it seemed to the husband that the man had made some eye contact with his wife. It makes no difference how the woman looks, because in the eyes of her husband she’s his property, and the other man is like a thief.
Oren: Poor woman.
He loves her.
Orit: But she suffers as a result.
He loves her.
Orit: But she suffers from such a type of love.
Maybe she’s not suffering; maybe she truly feels she belongs to him.
Orit: She feels that she’s afraid to leave, because he will come after her.
To be “sacred to the husband” means to belong to the husband. That's how it is from nature.
Orit: So we will reach agreements in advance.
Correct.
Orit: We need to know what this agreement actually says. It’s not just words.
The agreement is that the husband is obligated to provide his wife with "her food, clothing and conjugal rights"1 and if he gives her all that, then he is. You are asking “what is he conceding, what is he doing?” He gives that, and that’s all.
Nitsa: If we look at the word “ belonging”, belonging isn’t necessarily a bad thing, belonging actually sounds like a good thing, so how is the correct relationship built between a couple for the correct feeling of belonging?
You should have gone to a lawyer and signed a contract, maybe twenty or thirty pages, in which all cases in life are detailed. Then, all through life scrutinize and clarify what we're doing according to the agreement or not. How could it be like that?
Orit: But perhaps in the system we are discussing, which you would like to present, we can actually come up with an idea.
The idea is simple, “Love covers all transgressions.”2 If you show love, you don’t need any justification, scrutiny, nothing. If the man feels that you love him and you show it to him, as we constantly need to show it.
Orit: So he won't reach this situation to begin with.
Of course not and even if you went and enjoyed yourself, I enjoyed it too because I love you.
Orit: That’s beautiful.
Nitza: I heard in talks that you sometimes say that when there’s some kind of conflict, some kind of crisis, like this situation, we need to rise above the difficulty, rise above the problem and then try to really find the connection.
No, here we are talking about a situation where the man isn’t able to rise above it, for the woman for sure it’s easy to rise above, because she wants to forget about it, erase it, so what is it for her to rise above? In an egoistic way, she does it easily. The man is incapable of that and you can’t demand it of him.
Nitsa: In a state of distrust, distrust in general, when we encounter all kinds of situations in the couple's relationship, how do we act in such a situation? When something in the trust is broken, regardless if it is from the man’s side or the woman’s side.
Whoever is guilty and it doesn’t matter if it's an alleged or actual guilt, one must begin to change one's behavior, but in a gentle way, not overtly, rather in a truly gentle way, more and more towards the relationship. To invite the other out for a walk, to the movies, cafe, a vacation could be good, go visit the mother-in-law, brothers and sisters. Make plans with the other's sister or brother to come visit them, “cook up” such a visit. Meaning, as much as possible, strengthen the family connection, that’s one thing.
Secondly, where there are suspicions, show that there's nothing suspicious about it. Take your spouse to company parties, cafe, all sorts of places, where suddenly, as if by coincidence you meet your girlfriends who were at the party with you, and so on.
Nitsa: The first thing is that I take him out for a walk, take him out on vacation as you said, these are actions. What is the goal of all these actions, what stands behind them? Why am I taking him out for a walk?
To strengthen our relationship.
Nitsa: To strengthen our relationship by going out for a walk with him and going on vacation.
To relatives, the beach, it doesn’t matter where, walking with him holding hands. Yes, connecting us.
Orit: Could you say it’s rebuilding the relationship?
Yes, but not to show that to him and for it not to be artificial. Rather, truly begin to care because there’s a flaw and a need here.
Oren: We are nearing the end of our time for this talk; I would like to ask Dr. Laitman to sum up.
Is the topic “distrust?”
Orit: The topic was distrust in couple relationships.
Is it specifically about a man's distrust of his wife?
Orit: Yes.
Okay, because there’s also the opposite situation.
Orit: There is an opposite situation.
Oren: We didn’t have time to touch on that.
Okay, I think that from the side of the man to his wife, even with all the modernism in our world, it’s still worse. A wife has to take many actions in order to erase such a thing, maybe not erase but cover it. She has many options, through relatives, the children, her family and his family in particular, by going out to the movies, cafe, on a trip, whatever. She has to show that they have a good environment, including all those people with whom she was at that "dirty" party, as he sees it. At the end of the day, to strengthen the relationship and draw the environment closer.
Oren: Shall we end with that?
If the psychologists don’t have any questions; I didn’t have one to begin with.
Oren: So thank you Dr. Laitman, thank you Nitsa and thank you Orit, thank all the viewers too for being with us. We will continue with this series of conversations and discussing relationships and other elements of it, be with us. Until then, all the best and see you soon.
(End of talk)