Hi, my name is Paul Friedman. I am the founder of The Marriage Foundation and
today's topic is "How To Overcome Jealousy in Marriage" and this is a very
tricky thing because if we're talking about your jealousy then I could speak
directly to it. If you're talking about your spouse's jealousy then all I can do
is give you things that will help you cope. Why, why is that? Why can't I give
you something that will help your spouse overcome jealousy? And the reason why is
really rooted in a very deep principle and if you think about this principle
and if you get this it's gonna really help you in a lot of other areas of your
life. The principle has to do with the fact that you have free will as an
individual. You have free will which means everybody has free will and free
will is a double-edged sword. What it means is, and you may relate to this, no
one can tell you what to do. Nobody compels you to think a
certain way and I run across this all the time when someone writes to me who's
taking our course and they say my husband or my wife drinks a lot and I
think that's what's impacting them. How can I get them to stop drinking, and the
answer is you cannot and you can speak to any professional you want and it
always boils down to this. Until an individual wishes to change themselves
nothing and nobody can get them to do it. You can't bribe them, you can't punish
them into it, you can't compel them with force, you can't compel them with threats
nothing works and it wouldn't work with you. Now once
you have made up your mind, I am going to get rid of jealousy. I'm tired of this
jealousy that I carry, you can do it. So let me go to that first, how do you deal
with jealousy? Now it's gonna be very difficult for me to give you a cure that
will work in this video because it's a very deep kind of thing and it boils
down to the fact that you will have to learn how to control your emotions, how
to control your habits meaning how to institute new ones and get rid of old
ones and how to control your mind which is what it boils down to. And for that, we
have courses, two courses, they're all encompassing but it focuses in a very
beginning on this and jealousy is gnarly. So usually, you can't do it otherwise so
let's talk about where jealousy comes from and you'll get an understanding.
We are driven, we're souls, you're a soul and as a soul, you possess a mind, you
possess a body. You're not your body. If you lose a hand, you will say
"Well, I lost a hand," but it doesn't change who you are. You may be you with one less
hand but you're still you. Well, your mind is the same thing. You possess your mind
it's not you and this is one of the great failures in education
is that they don't teach us this in school that it's your obligation to
control your mind until you do because eventually, all of us need to learn how
to control our minds but until you do, until you have that realization, your
mind is basically controlling you and what do I mean by that. Well, what is your
mind and I'm not gonna break it down entirely
but basically, you might say that your mind is your habits and your instinctive
reactions and your emotions. Simple enough, that's really all there is
and what has happened is, and I'm not going to get into a really long
explanation but you could look at more of my stuff and you'll learn
about it but basically, if you're not controlling those they are controlling you.
You have to learn how to watch your mind and where do those come from.
Well, the habits that's a really good device. Think of it as software that's
gone bad if you will, if you don't have good habits but most your habits are
good so it's a great tool. The problem comes in when you have like a jealousy
habit then you have to learn how to watch your mind and stop it before it
acts on this trigger, this jealousy trigger. Why do you have a jealousy
trigger to begin with? Because you have a body, remember there's three parts to you
so the body is all about one thing and you know this already, your body is all
about survival and survival manifests in primarily two ways. One way is through
the flight-or-fight routine where you you need to defend yourself against any
adversary and you also have to have opportunity, and then the second part is
all about procreation but we don't have to get into all that. So jealousy, as you
can well imagine is embedded in the survival component that is afraid that
you, if it's you, or your spouse is concerned that they will lose their mate
or more sort of grossly their possession. You're their possession and
they're your possession in this perverse part of the mind so that's where the
jealousy is coming from. It's survival is depending on it so if it's you who has
the jealousy problem you really should look at the course that The Marriage
Foundation has whether you're a man or a woman based on that it's the one you
choose, it's much easier way to deal with this but if it's your spouse that has it
you need to understand that nothing you say or do is going to get them to change.
They may suppress it a little bit. They may try to hide it a little bit but
until they've made up their mind all you can do is out of love for them is
reassure them and don't be annoyed anymore by this bad habit that they have
this tendency that they have. See it, and this is important, see it as a handicap
that is crippling to them and it causes them all kinds of grief
so don't see it as how it's affecting you. See it as how it's affecting them
which is the right way to behave when you're a spouse through love and there's
nothing you can do other than assure them, remind them that you love them.
Do not be critical of it. It won't help. It'll hurt, it'll cause them to be more
suspicious if you say something so all you can do is you could say, "Honey, I
totally understand and I'm sorry if I gave you any cause for you to be jealous."
And you have to mean this, you have to turn your mind into very understanding
and compassionate and I will do my best to not give you any more cause.
I certainly could never imagine myself being with someone other than you and
you just reassure them. They won't hear it completely but it will help. It's all
you can do. Alright, so those are the two sides. One side is it's your spouse
there's nothing you can do and feeling frustrated about it's not going to help
anything so you got to get past that. You've got to be mature enough to be
compassionate enough to understand that it's their problem. Don't allow it to be
your problem. However, if it is your problem, if you're the one who's
suffering from jealousy then you need to learn how to control your mind. Just
controlling the jealousy won't work. You have to have a deep understanding of how
the mind works. You have to understand its mechanisms and see that it's a
composite of triggers, memory, thoughts from the outside that are going to
trigger it some more, things that you see. It's a weakness within your mind and you
have to learn and it's doable. It's more than doable.
You can own this within days but you got to use a scientific process and I mean
you could try on your own but it's really a tough one. The last thing I
want to say is that jealousy is never ever rooted in the truth of the matter.
A jealous person will always say, "I know they're cheating. I know that other women
are looking at them. I know that other men are interested in her." That's just
the mind deceiving you. Don't believe it, don't believe it. That's not the problem.
The problem is how badly you're being beaten up by it, that's the problem
and it can be fixed. Alright, so if you are suffering, if you're the one who's
suffering from the jealousy then you truly have my sympathy but you also have
a way to deal with this. If it's your spouse then rise above it and it will
work and nothing else will. Bear that in mind, it's almost like a either/or okay
you either rise above it or suffer from it all you want and rising above it
trust me is a whole lot easier than what they have to deal with. Alright hopefully
this was beneficial to you I really hope so.
If you want to put some comments and exchange some ideas, I'm happy to respond.
If this was a useful video for you like it and share it with your friends, your
family or whatever, maybe your spouse and other than that blessings to you
blessings to your spouse, and blessings to your family. Thank you!