Hi, I'm dr. Joe beam, founder, and chair of marriage helper marriage.
Hilbert's a 501 C three nonprofit organization based in the United States,
actually based in the great state of Tennessee.
Although we work all over the world in various ways,
it's a way we try to help people with her marriages.
And therefore we called marriage helper.
I want to start off with a topic that we introduce on Facebook for people to
come to the program for the first few minutes to understand what we're going to
talk about. Now, the topic we said, we start with this morning, well,
or afternoon, based on where in the world you are, is having to do with affairs.
And we announced that I would give three reasons to end an affair.
Now, I understand this. If you or somebody, you know,
is in an affair and a fair would necessitate by definition that at least one
person involved in it, his married to somebody else,
it could be that both of them of course are married to somebody else,
but at least one. And so when I talk about an affair,
I'm not talking about two single people who are sleeping with each other,
and that's a different topic I'm talking about where that at least one of these
people is married. If not both and clandestinely,
usually what it means about that.
What I mean by that is it's going on behind the back of the spouse.
So whether you're the married person or the one sleeping with the married
person, we're still going to give you the same three reasons today.
The first thing I asked you to consider,
if you are thinking about ending the affair, I mean, you may be in an era now.
I'm thinking there's no way on earth, dr. Beam. I'm not about to end this thing.
I'm happier than I've ever been. Well,
still I asked that you listen to these three reasons for ending an affair.
And if indeed you have vacillated or your partner has vacillated,
what I mean by that is that he or she is thinking,
maybe we shouldn't continue with this,
or you are thinking that same kind of thing. And as I just said,
for those who are right in the middle of it and think that this is the best
thing that ever happened to me, please think about these three things.
Number one,
when you live inconsistently with your beliefs and values,
you become a different person. Now,
the beliefs are those things that you hold to be true,
and the values are the way that you expect people to live, to behave,
to act based on what you believe to be true. Now,
if indeed your belief in value system is that marriage is to be just between two
people and that this should last a lifetime that you've made of out each
other. That's not just a legal bond,
but you've actually committed each other to each other, to live for a lifetime.
Then if you are violating that Val,
you are living in contradiction to your belief in Vegas system. And we think,
well, that doesn't really mean anything. Well,
it definitely does because when you do that,
you are definitely becoming somebody different than what you were.
And so if your belief in value system was,
marriage is an institution that should exist.
And when a person commits that we're going to be together for the rest of our
lives. We need to do that in sickness and in health and in wealth and impasto,
and when you're not wealthy, all those kinds of things.
If you believe that to be true, then you know that you are.
Violating your morals, you're violating your beliefs and values,
and you have to become somebody else because your beliefs and values are part of
your identity. And you understand, and that, uh, cheating,
whether you're actually shooting on your spouse or you're helping your affair
partner cheat on his or her spouse.
Cheating is a total lack of integrity. You know,
don't get mad that I say that because you know,
that it is integrity is when you do the right thing,
even when it doesn't benefit you, integrity is when you do the right thing,
because it's the right thing to do. I remember a guy once a few years ago,
he was having an extramarital affair. We were talking about it.
We were actually riding around in his vehicle, talking God.
We had been friends for a long period of time.
We pulled into a convenience store and went in and he bought a pack of gum.
And the young lady behind the counter gave him too much change.
He got into the car, realized he'd got into my exchange, got out,
went back in and gave the money back to the lady and came back and said,
I had to do that because integrity demands it. Now he was my dear friend.
And so I could actually talk to him this way. I looked at him and said,
what does an integrity also demand that you be faithful to your wife?
Doesn't integrity, demand that you not be cheating on her with somebody else.
And so if you really want to become somebody different than who you are now,
if you want to become a person that does not have the high standards of your
beliefs and values to live in a certain way of life,
that you believe is the right thing to do,
then go ahead and have the affair if you will.
But it's self pleasing to the maximum.
It's all about you feeling what you want to feel at a given moment without
consideration to the other people involved in that marriage.
You say other people, I mean, you think there's more than one wife,
more than one husband? No. The other people involved in that marriage would be,
for example, if you have children, it also can be, for example, the in-laws,
there are all kinds of people that are affected by a marriage.
Now that's the first thing. If you're contemplating ending an affair,
remember the sooner you stop doing something that's in contradiction.
Do you believe in value systems? The sooner you can start being.
You again, maybe.
Better you than you were before,
because you've learned some things the hard way. Now,
a second thing to remember or think about if you're trying to decide whether or
not to engage in a various that emotions change,
but consequences. Last,
what I mean by that is that typically somebody involved in an affair is saying
things like, but you don't understand how this feels.
And they're either referring to intense emotions or feeling toward the affair
partner or the intensity of the sexual union itself at a
younger guy, he was early thirties telling me about it.
He was having an affair with a woman who was in her fifties,
and that was the most phenomenal sex he'd ever experienced in his life.
And he was telling me, I will give up my marriage.
I will give up my children so that I can feel this intense emotion is
going to be amazing. It's amazing.
Now it's going to be amazing for years to I'll swap whatever I need to I'll
trade in. Whatever I need to,
to have this appoint to him was it's not going to be. You see,
if you look at the deep emotional intensity of an affair,
there's actually research about that out there. And I'm average.
It can last somewhere between three months and 48 months and 48 months as the
extreme, most of them are going to last less than two years. And so that deep,
intense emotion that you feel is not always going to be there. Oh,
if you're saying, but the sexual pleasure is amazing. It's going to stop too.
Or at least it's going to decrease dramatically.
There's a thing called sexual habituation.
Any two people that are making love to each other over a period of time will
eventually lose the order.
What I mean by that is that sex doesn't necessarily go away.
Hopefully it doesn't in a good marriage for example,
but it gets to the point where it doesn't have the same intensity it has.
Now it can become more mundane. And so if you think, well,
I'm going to keep doing this because of the intense emotions.
I feel whether they're emotional or sexual,
I'm telling you that it's going to stop. And if you're looking at me saying,
you don't know what you're talking about.
Unfortunately I really do.
Not just from experiences in my own life,
not just when the thousands of couples that we've helped and with their
marriages and their situations, but also from reading research. After research,
after research project, it's going to stop, but the consequences,
don't you say? What does that mean? Well, that's the third thing I think about.
There are always consequences for behaviors. We often tell people, well,
you gotta think 10, 10, 10. How are you going to feel about this in 10 days,
10 months in 10 years, actually,
that was a book by Susie Wilson talked about that.
And the consequences for not just before you,
but it'll also be for all those others involved in the marriage that I've
already mentioned. It's interesting that in one of our, um,
things that we do with couples, we ask a question and ask people,
individuals to answer the question, if they will.
And it's like bringing something from your childhood that represents the
emotions of your childhood, and then explain what those emotions were.
It's fascinating how many adults who are in classes with us.
So we ask that question,
we'll start talking about different things from their childhood and how many of
them actually bring up their parents divorce about this particular item reminds
me of my parents' divorce. If I were to bring a Jack Daniels bottle,
for example, or if I were to bring the telephone, whatever it might be,
this reminds me of my parents' divorce.
And then they start talking about how painful it was and how it still affects
them to this day. You see people used to say, well,
you shouldn't sit together for the children.
Then they realized how selfish that sounded like you're just discarding the
children altogether. You don't care what they think.
You don't care what they feel. And so then they modified it to, well,
it's actually better for the children.
That just isn't true. Now,
are there rare situations where it's better for the children? The answer is yes.
I mean, if they're in jeopardy,
if they're endangered getting away from the person causing that danger makes all
the sense in the world. But generally speaking,
the greatest fear that kids have is losing a parent. And so therefore,
if you continue in this affair and the consequence winds up that your
children find out about it, even if you stay together,
they're going to be affected by it.
Or if indeed your spouse divorces you because of it.
Or if it's your lover, that's a married woman,
his or her spouse divorces that person because of this.
Then it's going to be an effect on him, on you, on the children, on everybody.
Oh yes. And don't forget that on you. Whether you're the married one or not,
it's definitely going to affect your future in years and years to come.
I can't tell you the number of people I run into who said,
I wish somehow I could get all that back. I wish I could do it differently now.
Why? Well, it became somebody. I didn't want to be. Why?
Because I was intense emotions to that experience finally went away,
but the consequences didn't go away. And now I'm reaping what I've sown.
And you can call that karma. You can say what goes around, comes around.
And the reason those kinds of phrases exist is because throughout humanity,
our experience has been that you pretty much do reap what you sow,
what you put out there is what comes back to you. And so if you,
through a lack of integrity or violating beliefs and values,
you throw a lack of integrity or thinking about what you feel.
And I'm talking about your husband, your wife, your children, the damage,
this being done to them. Then what do you expect to come back to you someday?
Oh, and it's not just consequences in your life.
What consequences do you expect to come into the lives of your children someday?
Because you see this research about that,
that if indeed you want I'm divorced because of this. For example,
your kids are much more likely to get divorced themselves.
They'll have a different view of marriage than kids who grew up in homes that
were together and solid.
So it's all your decision you make up your mind about what you do.
But those are three reasons to end an affair.