PROGRESSIVE IMPACT

An interesting new study indicates that it may not always be good or useful to make sacrifices or be giving to your partner in a relationship. It may depend on the level of stress you experienced during the day. The study, from the University of Arizona, suggests that while making sacrifices in a romantic relationship is generally a positive thing, doing so on days when you are feeling especially stressed may not be beneficial. Researchers found that individuals who made sacrifices for their significant others generally reported feeling more committed to their partners when they performed those nice behaviors. But when they made sacrifices on days when they had experienced a lot of hassles, they did not feel more committed.

The study found that the daily hassles reported by an individual affected feelings of closeness and satisfaction for both partners, regardless of which one experienced those hassles. The study, published in the Journal of Social and Personal Relationships,  is summarized in the following report by Science Daily: Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, psychological health

An interesting new study of 5000 adults conducted by researchers at the University of Michigan finds that there’s an important link between what goes on in your relationship with your intimate partner and the likelihood of depression over the years. That is, the poorer the quality of the relationship, the more likely the person was to become depressed over time, Researchers found that people with the lowest quality relationships had more than twice the risk of depression than people with the best relationships. The quality of a person’s relationships overall was also linked with future depression potential, but the relationship with one’s spouse was most significant.

From the research, published in PLOS ONE, and reported by Science News: The study assessed the quality of social relationships on depression over a 10-year period, and is one of the first to examine the issue in a large, broad population over such a long time period. Nearly 16 percent of Americans experience major depression disorder at some point in their lives, and the condition can increase the risk for and worsen conditions like coronary artery disease, stroke and cancer. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Uncategorized adult love, depression, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, relationships

Jim, who’s in his early 40s, consulted me about a troubling dilemma. He told me that he’s worked on himself for years, both with and without the help of therapists, and that he’s “tamed many demons” from the traumas and family dysfunctions he experienced growing up. He’s now living a stable and reasonably successful life. Yet he finds himself asking “Now what?” and “Is this it?” He explained that he’s learned to manage and cope pretty well with the residue of conflicts that had, in the past, derailed successful relationships as well as his career. Nevertheless, he feels trapped by the past actions that continue to have a shelf life. And, especially, he wants to experience a more fulfilling, expansive existence, beyond the “flat-lined comfortableness” that Cheryl, a 38-year-old small-business owner, described about her own life.

They and others reflect the impact of living in today’s world, especially since the new century began. Our lives now exist within a new normal of uncertainty and turmoil, of unpredictable events and rapid social change, as well as ever-evolving technology that infiltrates every aspect of daily life. This new environment raises an important question: What describes a fulfilling, positive and psychologically healthy life today? Moreover, what can you do to create it?

That’s where our traditional thinking and prescriptions fall short. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" inner life, psychological health, psychology, resilience, spirituality

Once again, we find more evidence that daily stress has a long-term negative impact on mental health. Any research that highlights this fact is helpful, but it also draws attention to the role our social conditioning plays in generating the stress that debilitates mental health. And that’s not addressed as much as it should be. I’m referring to the ways we learn to behave in our public and private roles – in relationships, in our careers — that define “success,” and what you learn to do to achieve it, in ways that steadily create emotional conflicts. Without addressing those issues, which include over-emphasis on manipulation, self-centeredness, domination-submission struggles, to name a few — it’s difficult to describe what can support the “emotional balance,” the researchers cite as crucial for avoiding long-term emotional problems.

The latest research about this, published in the journal Psychological Science, was conducted by Susan Charles, UC Irvine professor of psychology and social behaviour, and her colleagues. Here’s what they reported:

Our emotional responses to the stresses of daily life may predict our long-term mental health. The research suggests that maintaining emotional balance is crucial to avoiding severe mental health problems down the road. The study examined this question: Do everyday irritations add up to make the straw that breaks the camel’s back, or do they make us stronger and “inoculate” us against later tribulations? Using data from two national, longitudinal surveys, the researchers found that participants’ negative emotional responses to daily stressors – such as arguments with a spouse or partner, conflicts at work, standing in long lines or sitting in traffic – predicted psychological distress and self-reported anxiety/mood disorders 10 years later. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" anxiety, career dissatisfaction, psychological health, resilience, stress, workplace conflicts

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world inner life, mental health, mental illness, psychiatry, psychological health, psychology

Mobilizing your fear of an opposing political party’s agenda and policies has become pretty commonplace in political campaigns, today. Now, some new research sheds light on a previously unrecognized link between fear, its source, and just how it shapes one’s political position on polarizing issues. However, I think these findings also point to a much broader but overlooked role that fear plays in many facets of people’s lives. That includes career dilemmas, conflicts around personal values, and problems in intimate relationships. Fears can be subtly conditioned by society’s norms and family pressures. They remain largely unconscious, and can fuel a range of emotional conflicts and dilemmas about life-shaping decisions.

To explain, let’s look at the research. Conducted by a team from Brown University, Penn State, and Virginia Commonwealth University, and published in the American Journal of Political Science, it found that some people appear to have greater inborn tendencies toward social fears. That is, they tend to experience fear at lower levels of threat or danger than others. In effect, they’re wired that way.

The researchers found that such individuals tend to have more negative attitudes toward “outside” groups, such as immigrants and racial-ethnic groups. When the researchers looked at the self-reported political attitudes of the research participants — on a liberal-conservative scale — they found a correlation between negative attitudes toward those groups and conservative political views.

However, as the researchers pointed out, Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world careers, flaws in love relationships, inner life, psychological health, resilience

A recent psychotherapy patient, Ms. A., tells me that she’s felt lonely throughout her life. Her intimate relationships have been brief; her friends, few. In recent years she’s been suffering from one physical ailment after another. Another patient, Mr. B, has an active social life with friends and business associates, a long-term marriage and an extended family. Despite this socially full life, he complains of feeling lonely “right in the midst of everyone around me.” He, too, suffers from frequent illness.

Some new research finds that loneliness can harm your immune system and set the stage for a range of illness. Of course, our mind/body/spirit is all one. Each “part” affects each other “part,” so that’s no surprise. But there’s a lot more to the story. People like Ms. A and Mr. B appear different, yet are alike in other ways. That is, some people’s loneliness reflects an absence of positive relationships. That, in turn, may be rooted in long-term emotional issues that interfere with forming and maintaining relationships. Yet others have a full social life but feel lonely anyway. These apparently different situations raise a question: What promotes or creates the conditions for loneliness in today’s society? And, what would help alleviate the painful isolation and disconnection that some feel, regardless of the extent of their social connections? Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world inner life, interconnection, psychology, resilience, resiliency

A new study finds that loneliness has a negative impact on your immune system, and makes you more susceptible to illness. This should be no surprise: Everything is connected; we are one mind-body-spirit interwoven system, interconnected with the social and other “external” forces that shape our experience of life. The research, conducted at Ohio State University, was summarized in Science Daily as follows:

New research links loneliness to a number of dysfunctional immune responses, suggesting that being lonely has the potential to harm overall health. Researchers found that people who were more lonely showed signs of elevated latent herpes virus reactivation and produced more inflammation-related proteins in response to acute stress than did people who felt more socially connected.

These proteins signal the presence of inflammation, and chronic inflammation is linked to numerous conditions, including coronary heart disease, Type 2 diabetes, arthritis and Alzheimer’s disease, as well as the frailty and functional decline that can accompany aging. Reactivation of a latent herpes virus is known to be associated with stress, suggesting that loneliness functions as a chronic stressor that triggers a poorly controlled immune response. Read more…

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" anxiety, inner life, interconnection, psychological health, resilience, stress

Reading about General Petraeus’ affair with Paula Broadwell and General Allen’s voluminous correspondence with Jill Kelley – and their ignominious fall from grace – brings to mind the Egyptian myth, Osiris. He was killed and dismembered, and each of the 14 pieces of his body was buried in a different place. His wife Isis found all the parts and put them back together. Then Osiris came back to life, and they conceived a child together.

Later, I’ll explain what this myth can teach us about this latest “sex and power” scandal, which signifies more than just different views about affairs and adultery among high-profile people. One the one hand, some contend that adultery among military personnel is a personal matter, as foreign policy and military analyst Thomas Ricks said in a recent interview. In fact, Ricks argues in The Gamble that the significant issue for the military is the failure and decline of leadership. But others are morally offended by what they see as personal character flaws behind the sex scandal, and that such behavior indicates poor judgment on the part of leaders, as well.

But step back: I think this scandal is just a more extreme, titillating version of deceptions and lies that many people maintain in their public behavior, at the expense of private truths. For some, the chasm between public lies and private truths is driven by Read more…

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Politics, Psychological health in a post-globalized world career dissatisfaction, flaws in love relationships, inner life, psychological health, sexual conflicts

This article, by AP writer Martha Irvine, highlights an issue worth deeper exploration: the simultaneous upside and downside of being always wired. Especially its impact on both well-being and a sense of interconnection, of community. The latter is visible during Hurricane Sandy’s impact on our lives.

She writes:

When was the last time you were alone, and unwired? Really, truly by yourself. Just you and your thoughts — no cellphone, no tablet, no laptop. Many of us crave that kind of solitude, though in an increasingly wired world, it’s a rare commodity. We check texts and emails, and update our online status, at any hour — when we’re lying in bed or sitting at stop lights or on trains. Sometimes, we even do so when we’re on the toilet.

We feel obligated, yes. But we’re also fascinated with this connectedness, constantly tinkering and checking in — an obsession that’s starting to get pushback from a small but growing legion of tech users who are feeling the need to unplug and get away.

“What might have felt like an obligation at first has become an addiction. It’s almost as if we don’t know how to be alone, or we are afraid of what we’ll find when we are alone with ourselves,” says Camille Preston, a tech and communication consultant based in Cambridge, Mass.

“It’s easier to keep doing, than it is to be in stillness.”

One could argue that, in this economy, Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" global citizen, interconnection, psychological health, social impact, stress, workplace conflicts

Here I expand on a previous post that described some interesting research findings:

Would it surprise you to learn that according to new research, men and women who harbored doubts about marrying their partners have a higher rate of divorce after four years of marriage? It sounds like one of those no-brainer discoveries. But it reminded me of what one of my graduate school professors said some decades ago, that it can be useful to “demonstrate the obvious.”

Here’s why, in this case: The research underscores how often people know an inner truth, but don’t act on it. They might hold back because of various fears, such as fear of affirming themselves. Or, from pressure to acquiesce to what their families or conventional thinking tells them their “right” decision should be.

I’ve seen several examples, such as a corporate executive I’ve been helping to better integrate his leadership role and his personal life goals. While reflecting on the latter, he said, “I remember, as I was walking down the isle – literally – to marry her, I said to myself, ‘I shouldn’t be doing this. I’m making a huge mistake.’”

Let’s look at what the new research found, and what it tells people that’s important to heed – for those at the entry point of marriage, and for those much further down that road. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, sexual conflicts

One of my grad school professors decades ago said that there can be value in research that demonstrates the obvious. Here’s a good example: A UCLA study of 464 couples found that those who harbored doubts about marrying their spouses had a much higher divorce rate after 4 years, than those who didn’t. The study, reported in the Journal of Family Psychology, found that 47 percent of husbands and 38 percent of wives said they had doubts about marrying their partners. But after marriage, women divorced more: That is, 19 percent of women who had pre-wedding doubts were divorced four years later, compared with 8 percent of those who did not report having doubt; while 14 percent of husbands who reported premarital doubts were divorced four years later, compared with 9 percent who did not report having doubts. Old but true idea: Listen to your inner voice!

Here’s a summary of the study and its findings, from Science Daily:

In the first scientific study to test whether doubts about getting married are more likely to lead to an unhappy marriage and divorce, UCLA psychologists report that when women have doubts before their wedding, their misgivings are often a warning sign of trouble if they go ahead with the marriage. The UCLA study demonstrates that pre-wedding uncertainty, especially among women, predicts higher divorce rates and less marital satisfaction years later. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, sexual conflicts

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, inner life, marriage conflicts, psychological health, sexual connection

A couple drives to a dinner party in stony silence. Each is harboring feelings about a disagreement over a financial matter from earlier that afternoon. Both had shut down after a few minutes of talking about it. Neither one revealed their deeper concerns, which were the true source of the disagreement. So now, they continued driving in silence, hoping the residue wouldn’t weigh on them throughout the evening as they tried to stay engaged with their friends. But the unspoken thoughts and feelings added another brick in the wall between them.

Like many, this couple often concealing parts of themselves from each other, especially around deeper, more intimate feelings and thoughts. Practicing what I call Radical Transparency could have helped them stay connected while getting to the root of the conflict. This post explains why a transparent relationship is essential for sustaining intimacy in a romantic relationship.

Consider this irony: Transparency is burgeoning all around us, but relationships seem to be stuck in a last-century time warp, untouched by the changing world and the public exposure of most everything that used to be easy to hide. That is, our hyperconnected, social-media dominated world bursts with transparency via public exposure of truths and realities that appear almost immediately via YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, blogs and a host of other vehicles. The lies of politicians, atrocities by despots who try to deny their actions, ethical transgressions by corporations and their executives all become quickly exposed to the world.

The Problem

Relationships are hard. Couples grapple with Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, inner life, psychological health, sexual conflicts

I’ve seen this repeatedly over the years working with men & women in their careers and personal lives: The research finds that men who are not so traditional in their masculinity have better quality relationships with their female partner. It’s summarized in Science News, from the journal Sex Roles:

Macho men whose partners earn more than they do have worse romantic relationships, in part because the difference in income is a strain for them, according to a new study by Patrick Coughlin and Jay Wade from Fordham University in the US. Conversely, men who are not so traditional in their masculinity do not place as much importance on the difference in income and, as a result, appear to have better quality relationships with their female partner.

The work is published online in Springer’s journal Sex Roles. The breadwinner role for men is still the accepted norm in marriage, and allows for and supports the husband’s power and authority in the family. It is therefore reasonable for a man who earns less than his female partner to feel removed from this traditional gender role, and feel a void because he does not fulfil this role. However, the reality is that marriages in which both the husband and wife work are becoming the rule rather than the exception. It is increasingly possible for both partners to either earn equal amounts, or for the female to earn more than the male.

Coughlin and Wade were interested in the effects of this growing trend on the experience of marriage and the quality of romantic relationships in particular. Is the extent of men’s masculinity ideology, in other words, emotional control, success, dominance, violence, power, and anti-femininity and homophobia, an influential factor on relationship quality?

A total of 47 men, who were involved in a romantic relationship, and had a female partner who had a higher income, took part in the study. Through an online survey, the researchers assessed their beliefs about masculinity, the quality of their relationships, and the importance of the disparity in income between them and their female partners.

They found, on the one hand, that the stronger a man’s endorsement of traditional masculinity ideology, the more likely he was to report a low-quality romantic relationship, and the more he perceived the difference in incomes as important. On the other hand, the more a man endorsed non-traditional masculinity ideology, the more likely he was to have a high-quality relationship with his female partner and not place too much importance on the income disparity.

The authors conclude: “Our results demonstrate the importance of masculinity ideology in understanding how and why men with higher-earning partners will have low or high quality romantic relationships. The findings are relevant to men who are married as well as non-married men in a romantic relationship.”

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, psychological health, workplace conflicts

Some time ago I described six different kinds of affairs people have, today, and mentioned that an affair could be psychologically healthy. Many readers have asked me to explain that more fully, so I’m doing that here.

Previously, I described the psychology of six kinds of affairs: the It’s Only Lust affair, the “I’ll-Show-You” Affair, the “Just-In-The-Head” Affair, the “All-In-The-Family” Affair,the “It’s-Not-Really-An-Affair” Affair, and the “Mind-Body”Affair.

I described their psychological motives and consequences, neither advocating nor condemning them. However, affairs usually reflect something about a person’s existing relationship that’s not being faced. Easy to do in today’s culture, where surveys indicate adultery is no longer the major reason for divorce, and it’s increasingly accepted, even advertised. Nevertheless, affairs can be psychologically healthy for some people. Here are four kinds:

A Marriage In The Dead Zone

Some suffer in a dead relationship, beyond repair. Research shows that an unhappy marriage, marked by daily conflict, damages your physical and emotional health. Yet, some settle into just accepting it, becoming numb and depressed without hope for change. Here, an affair can be a healthy act. It may reflect an unconscious or semi-conscious awareness of a desire to become more alive, to grow. That is, an affair can provide feelings of affirmation and restore vitality and can activate courage to leave the marriage, when doing so is the healthiest path. The affair can generate greater emotional honesty and mature behavior. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, affairs, flaws in love relationships, psychological health

Some interesting reflections on how music can impact your life, from Mark Edmundson, Professor of English at the University of Virginia, and author of Why Read? This essay, “Can Music Save Your Life?,” was published in The Chronicle of Higher Education. He writes:

Who hasn’t at least once had the feeling of being remade through music? Who is there who doesn’t date a new phase in life to hearing this or that symphony or song? I heard it – we say – and everything changed. I heard it, and a gate flew open and I walked through. But does music constantly provide revelation or does it have some other effects, maybe less desirable?

For those of us who teach, the question is especially pressing. Our students tend to spend hours a day plugged into their tunes. Yet, at least in my experience, they are reluctant to talk about music. They’ll talk about sex, they’ll talk about drugs but rock ‘n’ roll, or whatever else they may be listening to, is off-limits. What’s going on there?

When I first heard Bob Dylan’s “Like a Rolling Stone” in 1965, not long after it came out, I was amazed. At the time, I liked to listen to pop on the radio, the Beatles were fine, the Stones were better. But nothing I’d heard until then prepared me for Dylan’s song. It had all the fluent joy of a pop number, but something else was going on too. This song was about lyrics: language. Dylan wasn’t chanting some truism about being in love or wanting to get free or wasted for the weekend. He had something to say. He was exasperated. He was pissed off. He’d clearly been betrayed by somebody, or a whole nest of somebodies, and he was letting them have it. His words were exuberantly weird and sometimes almost embarrassingly inventive and I didn’t know what they all meant. “You used to ride on the chrome horse with your diplomat / Who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat.” Chrome horse? Diplomat? What?

I sensed Dylan’s disdain and his fury, but the song suggested way more than it declared. This was a sidewinder of a song, intense and angry, but indirect and riddling too. I tried to hear every line. Dylan’s voice seemed garbled, and our phonograph wasn’t new. I can still see myself with my head cocked to the spindle, eyes clenched, trying to shut out the room around me as I strained to grab the words from the harsh melodious wind of the song. “Ain’t it hard when you discovered that / He really wasn’t where it’s at / After he took from you everything he could steal.”

Click here to read the full piece.

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world inner life, psychology, purpose, resilience

Not long ago conventional thinking about midlife held that it’s a time for holding on as best you can in the face of steady decline and loss. But if you’re a baby boomer, you know that’s shifted as fellow boomers show more attention to health and want continued vitality — even new growth – emotionally, sexually and creatively.

Nevertheless, many remain fearful of “going forth” or finding their “true self,” partly because they know that illness, tragedy, unpredictable events and death can and do occur. I’ve written about these themes in some of my previous posts. For example, about depression during midlife. But overall, I find that learning to embrace both the “positive” and “negative” experiences of midlife is the path to growing up into full adulthood. That’s especially relevant to the “Post 50″ years. So — here are five suggested steps:

Elevate and Expand Yourself

Build the core emotional and mental strengths of empathy and compassion. Much� research shows that this realm of your inner life is the foundation for well-being as well as for positive engagement and harmony, with people and events. Meditation helps “grow” those capacities. Research also shows that meditation leads to greater creative thinking. Another part of this step is “elevating” your perspectives about people and life situations. A broadened, more tolerant vista is especially crucial at midlife because seeing things from a “1,000 foot view” is the foundation for wisdom.

Embrace Death And impermanence

True, our culture avoids acknowledging death and change. But embracing them can lead to more intense connection with what really matters to you — what to go after, while there’s still time; and what to let pass by. Research conducted by the University of Missouri and the University of Leipsig confirms this, finding that awareness of death spurs re-thinking about your goals and values. It can also lead to greater physical health, through increasing your focus on healthy practices.

I wrote about change and impermanence in a previous post, and now, during midlife, Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world anxiety, inner life, midlife, psychological health, purpose

While driving in my car the other day I heard an old song that instantly transported me to a vivid scene in my life.� I�m a not-yet teenager, sitting in the kitchen and having an after-school snack.� I reach for the radio to tune in a Yankee�s baseball game, as I usually did (back then, games still played in the daytime).� But for the first time, I hesitated.� Instead, I turned the dial to a rock and roll station.

I recall feeling at that moment that something had just shifted in my sense of who I was; who I was becoming.� I believe it was more than just the rumblings of impending�adolescence, or thinking about that new girl in class.� It was a new awareness about who this �self� was, inside me; that I was no longer just the person I thought I was a moment before.� It was a turning point in my consciousness about myself.

We experience many turning points in our lives, whenever we shift direction this way or that.� Perhaps a decision about a relationship, or what interests to pursue.� Maybe about an educational or�career�choice.� Some turning points are conscious, others less so; some may be imposed by family or other persuasive people.� But all involve turning�away�from one path, and�towards�another.� And they shape the�self�that you experience and define as �you,� along the way.

In my work, I often ask people to describe what they think were the positive and negative consequences from their key turning points, because there�s always a message contained in what you turned away from, or towards.� It�s a message from Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world Buddhism, inner life, psychological health, psychology, purpose, resilience, spirituality, Sufism

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0"

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" anxiety, career dissatisfaction, inner life, marriage conflicts, psychological health, psychology, resilience, stress, workplace conflicts

You might have been looking forward to this holiday season as a time for more exciting sex with your partner.� Like many, you might have been hoping that a holiday schedule would create the right atmosphere for some good, maybe even great sex.� But, like many, you may feel disappointed that it hasn’t happened.� And you wonder why.

I’m often asked that question by men and women who feel puzzled about why things didn’t go so well, just when the situation seemed ideal.� It’s ironic, they think, because they’re absorb the flood of advice and prescriptions for having super sex out there.� The magazine covers touting “10 new techniques to drive him/her wild;” the online e-zines like Your Tango or Libido for Life.� Some of the advice is pretty sound, like that from the respected sociologist of sexual relations, Pepper Schwartz, or the advice on sexual matters that’s useful for both straights and gays from Dan Savage.� But there’s so much more that’s not so good.� It touts juvenile-sounding, superficial advice.

In fact, the majority of the advice, strategies and techniques overlook the core of a sustaining, mutually energized sexual connection: It’s Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, inner life, marriage conflicts, resilience, sexual conflicts, sexual connection

That’s how a man in his 50s described his life to me not long ago: “It’s my long slide home.” He was feeling morose, anticipating the long holiday period from Thanksgiving through the New Year and what he knew it would arouse in him. I often see the “holiday blues” strike people during this time of multiple holidays (Hanukkah and Christmas; as well as�Ashurah,�Bodhi Day, and�Kwanzaa). The tendency to reflect and take stock of one’s life often triggers sadness, regret, or depression — especially during midlife.

For example, this time of year can intensify feelings of losses you’ve experienced as well as fears about change, in general. In a�previous post�I described how you can become frozen into a mindset and perspective that your life is fixed and will spiral downward from your middle years onward. Such a mentality restricts your vision. You can’t see that it’s possible — and necessary — to continue evolving your life, while reframing your emotional attitudes about the life changes that will continue to occur. I’ve always liked a line from one of Norman Mailer’s�novels, “It is a law of life… that one must grow, or else pay more for remaining the same.”

Many of 78 million baby boomers, now in the thick of midlife, are vulnerable to feeling demoralized about their lives. For some Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world career dissatisfaction, midlife, psychological health, purpose, resilience

Whether you’re entering a new relationship or hoping to resurrect your existing — but flagging — relationship, the upheavals and changes of midlife can make anyone pretty apprehensive about what lies ahead. �That�s particularly true for many of the 78 million baby boomers who face a long stretch of middle years with greater health, new desires for personal growth, but no so much certainty about what keeps a love relationship alive for the long run.

I think what helps support a long-term, positive relationship through midlife is not so much finding the right�techniques�– for good communication, compromise, and so forth.� We know how many of those are available in all the� self-help books crowding bookstore shelves. Instead, it�s building your relationship’s�spiritual�core. By that I mean your sense of purpose and life goals as a couple; and dealing with how your values and ideals change and evolve over the years. The challenge is whether these and other spiritual dimensions remain in synch over your years together.

In this post I describe a path that can help build (or resuscitate) your relationship’s spiritual connection. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, empathy, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, midlife, psychological health, resilience, sexual conflicts

Despite the volumes of books and magazine articles advising midlife baby boomers how to prolong or renew their health, happiness and vitality, I continue to hear many of them tell me about feelings of stagnation and loss. Or worse, a sense of being on “a long slide home,” as one 50-something put it.

For example:

• You happened to catch an old episode of�“Sesame Street”�or�“Mister Rogers”�on TV, and you felt engulfed by a wave of nostalgia and loss over your children, who are now grown and building their own lives without you.
• �You worry about whether your career has peaked, especially when you’re reminded every day of the hordes of younger people coming up right behind you — or who’ve now moved ahead of you.
• You’re divorced and dealing with new challenges as a single person.
• Or, you’re married/with a partner, but feelings of passion and intimacy have faded like autumn leaves.
• �You’re stressed about your financial future in your later years, given our economic uncertainty.

I think there’s a core reason why such feelings and experiences aren’t helped all that much by the midlife guides and programs out there: We’ve learned to experience midlife through Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world anxiety, inner life, midlife, psychological health, psychology, purpose, resilience, resiliency

When I read the news that Paul McCartney is going to remarry, it brought to mind the challenge and trepidation so many people feel today about their prospects for keeping a love relationship alive. Whether entering a new relationship, like the former Beatle who’s about to turn 69, or hoping to resurrect one from the dead zone, the old adage that remarriage is a “triumph of hope over experience” can give anyone pause.

Even worse, some become outright despairing and cynical about love relationships in general. That became evident to me from some of the comments and emails I received about my previous post, in which I explained why most relationship advice doesn’t really help. There, I argued that most “expert advice” mistakenly focuses on techniques rather than on the relationship’s spiritual core — your sense of purpose and life goals as a couple, and how your values and ideals change and evolve over the years. The challenge is whether these and other spiritual dimensions are in synch.

Here, I want to point out one particular practice — a perspective, really — that helps build or resuscitate a relationship’s spiritual connection: learning to “forget yourself” when relating to your partner. I’ve described this Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, affairs, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, resilience, sexual conflicts

The other day I was browsing through Barnes & Noble, and as I passed by the rows of books about love and�sex I felt annoyed. Seeing those volumes brought to mind the biggest open secret in today’s culture: Most relationship advice doesn’t really help you and your partner improve — or sustain — your love life.

Most people know this to be true. And ironically, the never-ending stream — books, magazine articles, workshops and now,�websites and�e-zines — confirms it, because If any of them really did help, there wouldn’t be so many of them. In fact, substantial research confirms that these programs and advice aren’t very effective at all.

I think the reason this: Most of the prescriptions for restoring emotional and sexual vitality focus on the wrong things. Most teach�techniques – actions and strategies for having better sex, for improving listening and communication, or for successful negotiating around conflict. But if you want to deepen intimacy and build greater vitality in your whole relationship, you have to nourish its�spiritual core. Acquiring new techniques won’t do it. However, there are some practices that help you nourish your relationship’s spiritual connection, as I describe below.

What Handicaps Most Relationships

Let me explain. By “spiritual,” I’m referring to a less visible, less behavioral realm than most relationship advice and strategies deal with. Your relationship’s spiritual core includes, for example, your sense of purpose and life�goals as a couple; how your values and ideals may change and evolve over the years, as separate individuals and as a couple. The relationship challenge is whether these and other spiritual dimensions are in synch. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, psychological health, sexual conflicts, sexual connection

But even more interesting, I think, is the prospect of being able to evolve your whole person in specific new, healthy directions. I’ve often heard my�psychotherapy patients as well as my corporate executive clients ask – or lament – why they don’t think they can change, or grow.

Here, I’ll describe some of the evidence that conscious evolution is possible, and a part of building�psychological health; and then show five steps you can take to evolve yourself.

Much research indicates that the capacity for self-evolution — of your personality, mental capacities, relationships and actions in the world — is based on conscious intent.
That is, shaping your being is an art form – the way an artist develops, evolves and creates a painting; or a composer creates music. You can make your conscious being and all that emanates from it a work of art. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world common good, empathy, inner life, psychological health, purpose, resilience

Life has changed a great deal since we entered the 21st Century. Massive, worldwide economic, political and social upheavals are impacting all areas of our lives. Marriages (and equivalent relationships) are no exception. In fact, long-term relationships face new stresses and challenges. People enter them within a world of shifting social norms, diversity, and increasing openness about emotional and sexual engagements, including ones that differ from the conventional.

These new realities raise a important question for couples to face, head-on: Do you want to stay married at this point in your life — in your relationship as it now exists, and at this time in our culture?

Consider this: It may be psychologically healthier to end your marriage. That is, I think that the conditions and challenges of the 21st world – the “new normal” – point to considering a more radical way of life: Engaging in two different kinds of marriages may be a better response to the emotional and sexual realities of our fluid, interconnected world.

On the other hand, you might decide to reconstitute you marriage in ways more in synch with how each of you are “evolving” in your individual lives; and more consistent with your vision of what you want a partnership to be as you become older.

Let me explain both paths. Increasingly, people recognize that our post- 9-11 world — the economic downturn, global crises and uncertainties, the impact of climate change, the increasing diversity of our population, global interconnection, and a host of other shifts – all of it forms a new era of uncertainty, unpredictability and diminished expectations of career and material success.

Part of this new normal includes turmoil in people’s emotional and sexual attitudes and behavior, and generates what looks like contradictions in relationships. For example, Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, affairs, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, midlife, psychological health, sexual conflicts

The overall theme of my blog posts is about revising what we think a psychologically healthy life is, in today�s 21^st Century interconnected culture.� That is, what psychological health and resiliency look like in careers and organizations, and in intimate relationships.� Some of my earlier posts have described features of healthy relationships in this new era, based on new thinking and research studies.� And, that our culture undermines the emotional attitudes and behavior that support connected, energized intimate relationships � one�s that don�t go south after that early rush of excitement and passion fades.

In this and future posts I�ll describe more about what supports a positive relationship, emotionally, sexually and spiritually.� What won�t are the fantasized portrayals and simplistic formulas promoted by the advice and technique books and magazine articles.� ��Most of them don�t work anyway, and can do more harm than good because they can make couples feel inadequate if, for example, they can�t find the right words to reflect back to their partner; or they discover that the new sexual technique or tantric exercise just doesn�t arouse them.

This post is about a frequently overlooked first step towards a sustainable relationship with your current or future partner.� Couples I�ve worked with find it helpful because it builds the self-reflection and self-awareness you need for growing and evolving yourself in your relationship capacities.� I call this first step doing a �Relationship Inventory.�� With it, you can review, understand, and learn from your past relationships; and then face forward with greater clarity and capacity for creating and sustaining emotional and sexual intimacy in the present and future.

Begin by making a list of all your significant romantic relationships.� For each, Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, psychological health, resiliency, sex

This post continues what I wrote about in In my�previous post –�that we lack a clear, relevant description of what psychological�health is, in today’s world; and, how you can build it. �Here, I describe more about what a psychologically health life looks like – what it’s criteria are — in your relationships, your work, and in your role as a “future ancestor.”

To begin with, I want to emphasize that psychological health isn’t the same as the absence of mental or emotional disorders. For example, you can’t say that a happy person is someone who’s not depressed. Many people have consulted me who aren’t depressed by clinical criteria, but they aren’t happy with their work, relationships or their overall lives, either.

Moreover, self-awareness isn’t equivalent to health. It’s a necessary underpinning, but it’s not enough. Therapists often help their patients deepen self-awareness about the roots of their conflicts, only to wonder why they remain the same. Psychiatrist Richard Friedman described that dilemma in a recent�New York Times article in which he illustrated the puzzlement practitioners experience when they are confronted with the limitation of awareness, alone.

To the extent there’s a conventional view of psychologically health at all, it’s mostly equated with good life-management and coping skills. That is, managing�stress in your work and personal life, and coping with — if not resolving — whatever emotional conflicts you brought with you into adulthood.

A less visible view of psychological health also exists: Successful adaptation to and embracing of the dominant values, behavior and attitudes of the society or milieu you’re a part of. The problem here is that such socially-conditioned norms have also embodied greed, self-absorption, domination, destructiveness, and divisiveness. They’ve been equated with “success” in adult life.

The upshot is that you can be well-adapted to dominant attitudes and behavior that are, themselves, psychologically unhealthy. So you may be “well-adjusted” to an unhealthy life.

We’ve been witnessing the fruits of that form of “health” throughout our society in recent years, in the form of Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world empathy, health, inner life, psychological health, resilience, social responsibility, stress

The aftermath of the Tucson shootings is likely to spawn new discussion about serious mental illness and its legal implications. Coincidentally, the mental health establishment has been debating what to include or exclude as a mental and emotional disorder, for the forthcoming revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. For example, one controversy is whether to remove narcissism as a bonafide disorder.

In contrast to discussion about mental disorders, I think we’ve neglected its flip side: What constitutes psychological health in today’s world? What does it look like? And how can you promote it in your own life, your children and in society?

These questions loom large because the most psychologically healthy people and societies will be best equipped to create and sustain well-being, security and success in the tumultuous road we’re now traveling on.

Take a look: At the start of this second decade of the 21st Century our lives and institutions are reeling, trying to cope with an interconnected, unpredictable world turned upside down by the events of the first decade: terrorism that’s come home to roost; economic meltdown at home and abroad; rapid rise of previously “underdeveloped” nations; and in our social and political spheres, the rise of hatred, bigotry and intolerance, as Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupik commented on following the Tucson shootings. This upheaval has fueled what I described in recent posts a “social psychosis” that’s locked in conflict with a societal need to serve the common good.

The problem is that we know what severe mental illness as well as “garden variety” neurotic conflicts look like in daily life. Those have become more prevalent in the current climate. But what we think of as psychological health is pretty vague. Moreover, it’s a 20th Century view that doesn’t fit in the new world environment.

That is, psychological health has been pretty much defined as successful resolution and management of childhood traumas and conflicts; coping with stress and adapting to the world around you, as an adult. The problem is, that view has assumed a relatively stable and static world. One in which you can anticipate the kinds of changes or events that might occur. And when they do, a healthy, resilient person could bounce back to the previous equilibrium that existed. But today, there’s no longer any equilibrium to return to. Psychological health requires living with disequilibrium. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world anxiety, empathy, health, inner life, psychological health, resilience, resiliency

The following is a guest post by Tijana Milosevic,�a Belgrade-based freelance writer. Before returning to Serbia, Tijana received an MA degree from the School of Media and Public Affairs at the George Washington University in Washington DC and worked with various public diplomacy and international communications organizations in Washington. She currently lectures in media psychology and media research at Singidunum University for Media and Communications in Belgrade. Tijana was trained with the Radio Free Europe in Washington and BBC World in London. She is also the recipient of the Goldman Sachs Global Leaders Award and numerous Open Society Institute scholarships. tijana.milosevic@gmail.com

Coming from Serbia — a country of six million in Eastern Europe that once belonged to a larger, war-torn entity called socialist Yugoslavia — I wasn�t fully aware of the notion of �career anxiety� when I came to Washington DC for my MA degree. Until one evening, that is, at the very onset of the school year.� A colleague of mine who was just turning twenty-seven raised his glass and voiced his fear: �Twenty-seven: no serious job and no stable career track.�

I was twenty- three at the time and could not comprehend why anyone would be obliged to have a �career track,� let alone a stable one, especially at (what I saw as) the tender age of twenty seven. In fact, I had never entertained the concept the way my American friends were referring to it.

While many Americans move out of their homes when they�re 19 to hit college, the East- European model is quite different.� Countries are smaller, and if there�s any migration it is directed typically towards the capital, so young people continue to live with their families through college. Because of high unemployment rates and poor standard of living, they aren�t expected to become financially independent, and many depend on their parents well into their late twenties or even early thirties -without a sense of shame that such state of affairs entails in the US. These factors reduce the relevance of what Americans often describe as �the treadmill feel�- an almost compulsive desire for continuous promotions, financial gains, followed by a rise in social status, and an increasing social anxiety.

In societies that are similar to mine, the American model is looked down upon as �harsh capitalistic,� �individualistic� and above all �alienated,� as American parents are not perceived to provide enough financial and emotional support for their children. In fact my family and friends had observed that I shouldn�t have chosen America, since I would probably feel better in Western Europe – where life is not as fast paced as in the US and capitalism still has a �human face.�

For example, Americans still work nine full weeks (350 hours) longer than West Europeans do and paid vacation days across Western Europe are well above the US threshold. The French still have the 35 hour working week, while the hourly productivity is one of the highest in the world. On the other hand, in the US an increasing popularity of employment therapy suggests that a high-paying job still comes first, as job issues �have a huge mental health component,� and therapists emphasize the importance of �toxic co-workers and the ramifications of massive layoffs.�

Numerous writers have outlined the dangers of isolation and careerism in the American society. In her famous work �Eichmann in Jerusalem,� Hannah Arendt equates careerism with lack of thinking that led to Holocaust: �what for Eichmann was a job, with its daily routine, its ups and downs, was for the Jews quite literally the end of the world. Genocide [�] is work. If it is to be done, people must be hired and paid; if it is to be done well, they must be supervised and promoted.�

In Serbia even young and busy corporate-minded career professionals do not have to mark their calendars to meet with close friends.� One can always find the time for a spontaneous chat over coffee. Still, this laid back culture is now beginning to change with an increasing development of free market capitalism. �I still remember how strange it felt when I first came to DC and had to schedule coffees and lunches with people weeks or even months in advance. I found it odd that people rarely picked up the cell phone (which, granted, could be merely my personal experience, although many Americans confirmed it!) and would often leave the time and date of the call in their voicemails, which implied the other person might not get back to them in a while. I also came to discover that what Americans often referred to as �friends,� people from my region would prefer to call �acquaintances.� The term �friend� cannot be reserved for someone you meet once in a couple of months and do not know well enough to open up to.

Those experiences bring to mind a memorable line from from �Eat, Pray, Love,� a biographical story recently turned into a Hollywood blockbuster starring Julia Roberts: �You Americans know entertainment but you do not know how to enjoy yourselves,� Roberts plays a successful thirty-something American who decides to embark on a soul-searching trip to Italy, India and Bally after realizing her job, husband and newly bought house are not what she really wanted from life. Perhaps that�s a superficial take on what many would describe as an equally superficial Californian trend to �do something spiritual,� but the above quote shows there�s something to the American career frenzy that remains unique to the United States. The opportunity cost for �dolce far niente� or �the joy of doing nothing,� runs high.

Reflecting on this, I ran into an interesting take on �Eat Pray Love� by a 23-year old blogger: �We are not sympathetic to spiritual personal crises anymore. If you want to have an emotional breakdown about something, you better have a logical, elaborate and secular reason; otherwise you will be dismissed as whiny, annoying and laughable.� I wonder if her comment has to do with the lack of experience or the possibility that the generation entering the work force will not have an adequate justification for its desire to escape the treadmill feel– amidst all the superficial takes on this complex topic.

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" career development, career dissatisfaction, careers, gen x, gen y, global citizen, inner life, psychological health, workplace conflicts

Many people who enter�psychotherapy today aren’t helped at all. Some end up more troubled than when they began treatment. And ironically, some therapists are examples of the kinds of problems they’re trying to treat. In this post I explain why that is and how to become a more informed�consumer when considering psychotherapy.

The popularity of the TV show “In Treatment” is one indicator that there’s a large, market for psychotherapy, today. Despite the decline of the more orthodox psychoanalytic treatment – the kind that Daphne Merkin described in a recent�New York Times article about her years in treatment – people continue to seek competent professional help for dealing with and resolving the enormous emotional challenges and conflicts that impact so many lives in current times. Beyond healing, they want to grow their capacity for healthy relationships and successful lives.

Many skilled and competent therapists are out there. (I use term “therapist” to describe psychologists, psychiatrists and clinical social workers – professionally trained and licensed practitioners.) Moreover, research shows that psychotherapy can be very effective. Either alone, or sometimes in combination with the judicious use of�medication.

Yet so often practitioners don’t help people very much. Some struggle for years in therapy with one practitioner after another, and never seem to make any progress. Others resolve some conflicts, but then are hit with others that hadn’t been addressed.

I see three reasons for this situation. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world anxiety, psychological health, psychology, psychotherapy, resiliency, social responsibility, stress

After rebooting your life, it’s time for a remix.

In Part 1 of this post I wrote that the reality of life today includes much confusion, uncertainty, and confused emotions about pursuing success and wellbeing. In fact, our tumultuous, changing world spurs actions that often undermine rather than support psychological health. That’s visible in the dysfunction and unhappiness emerging from the choices, decisions and overall way of life of many people, today.

Based on current research and new thinking about�resiliency and psychological health, I suggested three practices for “rebooting” your life in today’s environment: Self-awareness (“Wake Up”); envisioning your life circumstances with out-of-the-box perspectives (“Lose Your Mind”); and actions that support positive growth rather than stagnation (“Push The Envelope”).

In Part 2 I propose that you combine “rebooting” your life in those ways with a life “remix.” That is, create an intent to activate six important dimensions of your life, each with a new, clear purpose. The “remix” reflects the holistic reality that everything you do in each “part” of your life affects and is affected by every other “part.” A life “remix” in the dimensions I describe below helps you evolve in healthy, proactive ways. And the latter is a necessity for positive,�resilient living within this fluid and uncertain world that we now inhabit.

The Six Dimensions:

Here’s what you do:

� Formulate specific new�goals for each of the following six interconnected dimensions of life. Each should be modest; that is, realistic and able to be achieved within a reasonable time-frame that you specify and commit to.

� Then, describe some specific actions you can begin taking right now that support each of the goals.

The six dimensions are: Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world inner life, midlife, psychological health, purpose, recession, resilience, resiliency, sexual conflicts, stress

There’s an old saying that if you want to see into your future, just look into a mirror. That is, how you live your life each day — through your choices, your values and behavior — shapes and determines who you will be in the future.

Many people today don’t like what they see when they look into that mirror. Especially when so much feels out of control: Economic decline with no end in sight; social and political changes that can feel frightening, even threatening; career uncertainty; relationships unraveling under stress; climate disasters, both man-made and natural. All of these events impact your mental health and overall well being, as research and survey data show: Emotional, physical and social symptoms are rising, such depression and anxiety, obesity, demagoguery from media personalities like Glen Beck, emotional disturbance in the workplace…the list goes on.

All of that can make you feel frozen in today’s world. How can you find a psychologically healthy path into the future, in the midst of such confusion and turmoil? And, within a cultural and political environment that feeds self-serving, shortsighted behavior?

I’ve been addressing the impact of living in our new world upon people’s emotional health on my posts for this blog, Progressive Impact.��In this post, I suggest three ways to “reboot” you life in positive ways, within today’s unpredictable, interdependent and often scary world.

Wake Up!

Common lore is that it’s harmful to wake up a person who’s sleepwalking, but that’s not true. And when you’re sleepwalking in your life, Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" anxiety, empathy, inner life, midlife, psychological health, purpose, resilience

A woman in her late 30s was telling me about her work-life conflicts. She has a busy career, three children, and a husband who travels a great deal for his own job. She suddenly paused, recalling a recent, terrifying dream: She’s on one of those moving sidewalks, and can’t get off. Passing by on either side are scenes of herself, but living different lives with different people. Suddenly she recognizes the Grim Reaper standing at the end of the sidewalk, arms outstretched, awaiting her.

She wakes up, screaming.

You might think her dream sounds more typical of someone in the throes of “midlife.” In fact, I think it reveals the need for new thinking about what we’ve called “midlife.” That is, changes in our culture and in how people live require tossing out old notions of “midlife” and the “midlife crisis.” With people living longer, healthier, productive lives, what used to be a narrower “middle” period of adulthood has greatly expanded.

Instead, think of a broad period of true adulthood that starts somewhere in the 30s. From that period onward men and women face a range of truly adult challenges of living and working in today’s world. This new, longer adulthood extends for several decades — recent surveys find that about 80% think “old age” begins at around 85 — so the term “midlife” is no longer accurate.

No surprise, then, that 30-somethings are reporting symptoms associated with a “midlife crisis” – marriage boredom, careers flatlining, work-life juggling, trying to keep it all together, trying to maintain sanity…and, wondering what the point of it all is, like in that Talking Heads song.

To better explain all this and how to reverse that “death spiral,” let’s look at recent contradictory Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world decline of romance, emotional conflictds, inner life, midlife, psychological health, purpose, resilience, resiliency, sexual conflicts

So often our romantic and sexual relationships end in regret, sadness, and loss. Initial feelings of excitement and connection just seem to slip through our fingers, and often we’re not sure why that happened. Nevertheless, men and women continue to hope for finding that elusive “soul mate,” a relationship of sustained vitality. But so often, partners descend into the “functional relationship,” or become lost in a maize of unfulfilling sexual connections or affairs.

In previous posts I’ve written about the roots of that seemingly inevitable decline and what helps. But there’s another part of relationship failure or loss that can be a basis of new growth. Let me explain. Over the decades I’ve witnessed countless examples of people drawn into new relationships that are simply new versions of previous, failed relationships — old wine in new flasks. And inevitably, disaster is lying in wait, right down the road. I think that often happens when an important part of the foundation for a positive, sustainable romantic and sexual relationship is neglected or overlooked.

That is, mental health practitioners focus a great deal on building better mechanics of listening, mirroring to each other, techniques of communication and compromise, and so on. All good stuff. But what can go missing is Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, affairs, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, midlife, psychological health, resilience, sexual connection

Upgrade To Career 4.0; Practice �Harnicissism;” and Become a Good Ancestor

In a previous post I wrote that a key pathway to psychological health and resiliency in today’s world is learning to “forget yourself.” This post describes ways to do that in three important realms of your life – your work, your personal relationships, and your life “footprint.”

In the earlier post I explained that “forgetting yourself” doesn’t mean neglecting your own legitimate needs or concerns. Rather, it means letting go of our human tendency to overly dwell on ourselves – our own concerns, needs, desires, slights, complaints about others, and so on. Psychological health and resiliency in today’s world grows when you can do that and put your energies in the service of something larger than yourself: problems, needs and challenges that lie beyond your own personal, narrow self-interest.

That may sound like a paradox, but it’s based on a new reality: Today’s world is changing more rapidly than you can imagine and is becoming immensely interdependent, interconnected, unpredictable and unstable. In this new environment you can’t create or sustain a positive, healthy life through the old ways of reactive resiliency, of coping and hoping to rebound.

That is, chronic unhappiness, dysfunction and overt emotional disturbance lie in store for those who remain too locked into thinking about themselves and who use old solutions to achieve success in relationships and at work. For example, trying to achieve power and domination over others, and thinking you can hold on to that. Fearing collaboration and avoiding mutuality with people who are different from yourself, or with whom you have differences. Looking for ways to cope with stress and restore equilibrium or “balance” in your life. And overall, being absorbed by your own conflicts, disappointments and the like. The latter are inevitable, and dwelling on them is a breeding ground for resentment, jealousy, and blame. That’s a dead-end. The consequences are visible in people who are unable to handle career downturn, who experience mounting relationship conflicts and who suffer from a range of psychological problems like depression, boredom, stress, anxiety and self-undermining behavior.

In contrast, positive resiliency in today’s environment is the byproduct when you aim towards common goals, purposes or missions larger than just your own narrow self-interests. That keeps you nimble, flexible, and adaptive to change and unpredictable events that are part of our new era. Then, you’re creating true balance, between your “outer” and “inner” life.

Here are three ways you can move through self-interest. Each describes a shift, or evolution from the older, reactive form of resilience to the new, proactive form:

Upgrade your career to the 4.0 version; Practice “Harnicissism;” and Become a Good Ancestor

Yeah, I know — those descriptions sound odd. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" career dissatisfaction, careers, empathy, global citizen, inner life, psychological health, resilience, resiliency, social responsibility, sustainability

Here’s a typical couple’s lament: “We just see things�differently.” That’s certainly true for many couples, but I see a deeper problem that undermines many relationships today. And it won’t be fixed by any of the�marriage education, relationship improvement or sexual enhancement programs out there. That is, often the problem isn’t that you and your partner see�things differently; but rather, that you see different�things.

Facing what that means can be painful. It may even feel relationship-threatening. But doing so can open the door to strengthening the true foundation of your relationship: Your�vision of life. That refers to what you’re really living and working for, both individually and as a couple.

That’s the fundamental core of a relationship, and it’s often overlooked or seldom discussed. When you do face it you may discover that you and your partner were never in synch about your vision of life. Or, that you may have gone off on different tracks over time. When either is the case, you end up seeing different�things altogether.

That’s a crucial problem because your core vision of life will increasingly impact your long-term health and well-being in today’s world, whether you’re in a relationship or not. We’re now living in a totally interconnected, unpredictable, “non-equilibrium” world. My 35 years as a psychotherapist and business psychologist convinces me that our new era requires a new and revised picture of psychological health and positive resiliency — what it looks like and what helps build it – to support your outward success and internal well-being in the years ahead. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, midlife, psychological health, purpose, resilience, sexual conflicts, sexual connection, soul mate

As a young boy growing up in upstate New York, I sometimes roamed through some nearby woods and fields. As I did that one bright summer afternoon I came upon a large tree � perhaps an elm or poplar.� I noticed that its trunk had a deep scar; it looked like it had been struck by lightning some years before.

That memory came to mind recently, while reading two recent New York Times articles about loss and love.� They appeared on the same day, and reflected two very different kinds of life events. Yet I think they go together, in a way.

One was the �Modern Love� column in Sunday Styles, titled �Affirmation, Etched in Vinyl,� by Connie May Fowler.� It was about the loss of her father from a heart attack, when she was six years old. Both parents appear flawed, apparently alcoholic.� But Fowler describes her mother as having been intent on portraying her father as malignant.� She writes that

��most of what I knew of him came from my mother, who considered him the embodiment of evil.�

And most significantly,

��My father�s death stole many things from me, including the sound of his voice.�

Ever since, she had longed to be able to know and hear what his voice sounded like. �Well, it turns out that her father had somewhat of a career as a country and western singer.

�The lack of any memory of my father�s true living voice was all the more perplexing to me because before my birth, my father, Henry May, had enjoyed a reasonably successful run as a country-western musician. He had a television show in Jacksonville, Fla. He and his band, Henry May and his Rhythm Ramblers, were a major draw all along Florida�s northeast coast.�

In her essay, Fowler describes her search for a record that he had made along the way, as she looked in old record bins and on e-bay, over the years.� Then, one day, she received a message from a stranger who had learned of her search and, in fact, had a copy of her father�s record in his possession. At last, she might be able to hear his voice.� Here�s Fowler�s full story.

The other essay is �First Love, Once Removed,� by Lee Montgomery.� It describes a drop-in visit by the son of her first lover, with whom she had many romantic and adventurous experiences in her early youth, during the 1970s.

�When I think of Ian, I think of endless days hanging out in the woods and fields around our New England prep schools, sucking dope out of a metal chamber pipe. Ian showed me the world and taught me to live in it. New York City. The Great West. And Europe, where we lived for several months during his first college year abroad. He was socially connected and wealthy, two things I was not. For a long time, it didn�t matter.�

Eventually, their relationship ended.� No surprise, for two 18 year-olds.� She went on with her life, married, began a career.� He inherited money, married

�� had no career that I knew of and shot himself when he was in his 30s.�

The son, quite young at the time his father committed suicide, was now about the age Montgomery when she and his father were lovers.� He had dropped by her office hoping to hear some stories of what his father was like. �Montgomery�s essay describes how fresh and alive the memories felt to her, as she drew into them and spoke with her young lover�s son about his father:

�Sitting across a booth studying this young man, I was overwhelmed. So many years later, I was stunned to find the feeling of first love still there.�

The full article is here.

To me, these two essays read like bookends.� Both portray the enduring loss of love and connection and how it affects us, permanently.� No matter whether it comes from a child�s loss of a parent, from the ending of an adult love relationship at any age; or from an unexpected death.� Or, for that matter, if the loss results from something you did that harmed or damaged a relationship that was important to you. None of those experiences can be undone.� Their legacy becomes woven into the larger tapestry of your life, where it remains, even as that tapestry expands over time.

And that�s what brought to mind the old tree trunk.� Damaged where the lightning had struck, I noticed that the trunk had continued to grow around it and gradually encompassed the damaged part within it.� It was like ourselves: Even if we continue to grow and change, learn from our experiences and continue on with our lives, our losses nevertheless remains part of us�. always there, a visible, enduring part of our lives.

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, flaws in love relationships, inner life, psychological health

This post is about the differences between “Hook-Up�Sex,” “Marital Sex,” and “Making Love.” I’ve found that confusion about those differences play out in many of the conflicts people experience in their sexual-romantic relationships, no matter what their ages or kinds of relationships.

First, some clarification about what I mean by each term. “Hook-Up Sex” refers to just plain f***ing; that is, a purely physical encounter. “Marital Sex” is the kind of sex life that most committed couples tend to have — married or not, straight or gay. And “Making Love” is a different kind of experience that transcends both of the other two kinds.

That is, the three kinds of sexual relationships occur on different planes, different levels of integration between your physical, animal being, and your relational and�spiritual beings. The kind of sexual life you have – and its conflicts – are embedded in the overall relationship you learn and how you “practice” it with your partner. I’ve described some of these connections in my previous posts, here and on my Psychology Today blog, on our�adolescent model of love, the�soul mate, and the positive power of “indifference.” Most relationships limit the capacity for “Making Love.”

Hook-Up Sex

“You know how there’s�good sex,�great sex, and then�really great sex? That’s what it was like with her!” With gleaming eyes, Ken was telling me about his latest sexual encounter. He was a 44 year-old trust fund guy who lived with his mother and had never married. He entered�therapy�because he wanted to learn why he hadn’t been able to form a lasting relationship.

In Hook-Up Sex you and your partner use each other’s bodies for your own pleasure. It can be extremely intense and arousing, especially when you feel lust towards a new partner. There’s a place for this kind of sex, but it’s also the most primitive, least evolved form of sex. It reflects the purely animal part of being human — our physiological needs and impulses. We share those with other animal species. From a human standpoint, though, it’s mostly void of relationship beyond the physical connection; a form of playing through using each other’s bodies.

Aside from Ken’s deeper emotional issues that he’d never faced or dealt with, another barrier to his forming a relationship was that he had turned sex into a technique-dominated sport. He saw himself as a great lover and, in fact, had become very proficient in Tantric sexual practices. Handsome and charming, he was able to find women eager to participate. Tantric and related practices are, in fact, part of “Making Love,” but they can also be misused. Ken’s mastery of them had become an end in itself, and they were entirely divorced from Read more…

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships adult love, affairs, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, psychological health, sexual conflicts, sexual connection

Following his victory over the establishment�s candidate in Kentucky�s Republican primary for the US Senate, Tuesday, Rand Paul repeated the familiar Tea Party mantra that his victory shows the Tea Party movement is sweeping across the country; that we�re going to �take America back!�

Well, OK, but take it back from what? And to what?

Well first, I think that many of those drawn to the Tea Party are genuinely concerned about the rising scope and size of government and want lower taxes.� Some have become fired up with rage about that (while also, of course, wanting to keep all the benefits and support that Big Government provides, as Louisiana Gov.Jindel recently discovered).

And some are so fired up that they just want to get rid of everybody on the Hill and the inhabitant of the White House � all those who are taking our country in the �wrong� direction.

But let�s take a look at what the Tea Party�s dominant ideology includes, with respect to what it thinks is the wrong course; what they advocate it it�s place; and, especially, what the Republican party is embracing as it bends over backwards to drink from the Tea Party�s cup (sorry for the mixed metaphors.)

Take Utah Republicans.� There�s a movement afoot to repeal the 17^th Amendment.� Having trouble remembering which one that is?� Well, it�s the one that gives people the right to vote for and select their Senators.� That�s right – elect their Senators.� Taking away that right is a favorite of Tea Party supporters, and they�re getting Republicans to join with them.

It gets better.� On the other side of the country, the Republican Party of Maine has adopted some Tea Party proposals of its own. It�s official platform calls for the elimination of the Department of Education and the Federal Reserve; demands an investigation of “collusion between government and industry in the global warming myth;” insists that “healthcare is not a right;” calls for the abrogation of the “UN Treaty on Rights of the Child” and the “Law Of The Sea Treaty;” and says we must resist “efforts to create a one world government.�� There�s more.� If you�re interested, here�s the whole thing.

The Maine Politics blog calls the official platform for the Republican Party of Maine �a mix of right-wing fringe policies, libertarian buzzwords and outright conspiracy theories.� It quotes Dan Billings, who�s served as an attorney for the Maine GOP, describing the new platform as “wack job pablum” and “nutcase stuff.”

In contrast to the claims of Tea Partiers around the country, Washington Post columnist E.J.Dionne has pointed out some actual facts.� He writes:

�…there was evidence on Tuesday that there are limits to the anti-government mood that is supposedly sweeping the country. �In Arizona — nobody’s idea of a liberal state — voters supported a temporary increase in the sales tax from 5.6 to 6.6 cents on the dollar, to raise $1 billion annually. This, coupled with a large tax increase on businesses and high-income earners endorsed by voters in Oregon earlier this year, suggests a pragmatic electorate that is far less reflexively opposed to taxes or government than Tea Party cheerleaders would have us believe.

He also points out that:

The most significant result for the fall was the Democrats’ success in holding the western Pennsylvania House seat left vacant by the death of John Murtha. Democrat Mark Critz won an impressive nine-point victory over Republican Tim Burns by distancing himself from Obama and liberal positions on guns and abortion, but also by running a relentlessly economic populist message on jobs and outsourcing.

Circling back to the rising star Rand Paul, the new candidate has also made it clear that he opposes the Civil Rights Act.� That�s the Act that most of the then-Republicans voted for, back in the days when Republicans were strong supporters of civil rights, back before the party morphed into a bastion of right-wing mostly southern white men.� Paul emphasizes that opposing the Civil Rights Act is not racist.� Go figure.

If you look at some hard data about what is, in fact, transforming our society, in contrast with what the Tea Party sees, it�s hard not to conclude that their appeal is to a small number of people and will remain a fringe movement.

Sometimes we become so convinced of our own convictions, when they are shared by others, that we seduce ourselves into seeing a movement that will transform the world.� There’s a long history to such delusions.

The sad consequence for our two-party system is that the Republican Party is allowing itself to upend it�s own principles and ideals as it tries to capture this “movement,” and thus risks marching into oblivion.

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world political delusions, Politics, psychological health, republicans, tea party

2. Building Your Inner Life

In a previous post, I wrote that your inner life is usually neglected, in contrast to your outer life.� I gave some guidelines for identifying and reducing the gaps between your inner and outer life.� That�s an important step towards building psychological health and resiliency that works in today�s 21^st Century world of heightened interconnection and instability.

Here, I�ll describe some specific steps you can take to strengthen your inner life and make it the driver of your decisions, choices, and actions within your outer life.

Think of your inner life as something you develop through practice, similar to building stronger muscles, or developing skill in a sport or play a musical instrument. Below are some inner life practices most anyone can do. The more you do, the better, because they reinforce each other.

Fill Your �Inner Reservoir�

• Sit quietly, without distraction. Observe your breaths as you breathe slowly, in and out. Count each breath as you exhale, from one to 10; then repeat. Twenty minutes daily is ideal, but if you do only five, that�s a good start.

An �entry-level� meditation-breathing practice, this one builds an emotional shock absorber.� It helps maintain centeredness and focus when dealing with your outer life demands and conflicts.

Some forms of meditation are rooted in Eastern and Western religious-philosophical traditions; others in current medical and scientific knowledge about effective stress-reduction. All provide a range of physical and emotional benefits that strengthen your inner life. Ongoing research supported jointly by the Dalai Lama and the U.S.-based Mind And Life Institute shows that meditation produces changes within specific regions of the brain associated with greater internal calm, resilience to stress, and focused concentration.

Amazingly, one study found that the sound Read more…

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1. �Why “Work-Life” Balance Is A Myth

Meet Linda and Jim, who consulted me for psychotherapy.� Linda is a lawyer with a large firm; Jim heads a major trade association.� They told me they�re totally committed to their marriage and to being good parents.� But they also said it�s pretty hectic juggling all their responsibilities at work and at home They have two children of their own plus a child from her former marriage. Dealing with the logistics of daily life, to say nothing of the emotional challenges, makes it �hard just to come up for air,� Linda said.� Sound familiar?

Or listen to Bill, a 43-year-old who initially consulted me for help with some career challenges.� Before long, he acknowledged that he�s worried about the �other side� of life. He�s raising two teenage daughters and a younger son by himself � one of the rising numbers of single fathers. �He�s constantly worried about things like whether a late meeting might keep him at work. He tries to have some time for himself, but �it�s hard enough just staying in good physical health, let alone being able to have more of a �life,� � he said. Recently, he learned he has hypertension.

It�s no surprise that these people, like many I see both in my psychotherapy practice and my workplace consulting, feel pummeled by stresses in their work and home lives. Most are aware, at least dimly, that this is unhealthy � that stress damages the body, mind and spirit. Ten years ago, a report from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, found that 70 percent of all illness, physical and mental, is linked to stress of some kind.� And that number has probably increased over the last decade. �Much of this stress comes from struggling with the pressures of work and home � and trying to �balance� both. The problem seems nearly universal, whether in two-worker, single-parent or childless households.

I think these conflicts are so common because people have learned to frame the problem incorrectly to begin with. That is, there�s no way to balance work life and home life, because both exist on the same side of the scale � what I call your �outer� life. On the other side of the scale is your personal, private life � your �inner� life. Instead of thinking about how to balance work life and home life, try, instead, to balance your outer life and inner life.

The Other Balancing Act

Let me explain. On the outer side of the scale you have the complex logistics and daily stresses of life at both work and home � the e-mails to respond to, the errands, family obligations, phone calls, to-do lists and responsibilities that fill your days. Your outer life is the realm of the external, material world. It�s where you use your energies to deal with tangible, often essential things. Paying your bills, building a career, dealing with people, raising kids, doing household chores, and so on. Your outer life is on your iPhone, BlackBerry, or your e-calender.

On the other side of the scale is your internal self.� It�s the realm of your private thoughts and values.� Your emotions, fantasies, spiritual or religious practices.� Your capacity to love, your secret desires, and your deeper sense of purpose.� In short, it embodies who you are, on the inside.� A �successful� inner life is defined by how well you deal with your emotions, your degree of self-awareness , and your sense of clarity about your values and life purpose.� It includes your level of mental repose:� your capacity for calm, focused action and resiliency that you need in the face of� your frenetic, multitasking outer life.

If the realm of the inner life sounds unfamiliar or uncomfortable to you, this only emphasizes how much you � like most peple � have lost touch with your inner self. �You can become so depleted and stretched by dealing with your outer life that there�s little time to tend to your mind, spirit or body. Then, you identify your �self� mostly with who you are in that outer realm. And when there�s little on the inner side of the scale, the outer part weighs you down. You are unbalanced, unhappy and often sick.

When your inner life is out of balance with your outer, you become more vulnerable to stress, and that�s related to a wide range of physical damage.� Research shows that heart attacks, stroke, hypertension, diabetes, a weakened immune system, skin disorders, asthma, migraine, musculoskeletal problems � all are linked to stress.

More broadly, when your inner and outer lives become unbalanced, your daily functioning is affected in a range of ways, both subtle and overt. When operating in the outer world � at work, for example, or in dealings with your spouse or partner � you may struggle with unjustified feelings of insecurity and fear. You may find yourself at the mercy of anger or greed whose source you don�t understand. You may be plagued with indecisiveness or revert to emotional �default� positions forged during childhood, such as submissiveness, rebellion or self-undermining behavior.

Even when you�re successful in parts of your outer life, neglecting the inner remains hazardous to your psychological and physical health. Without a developed inner life, you lose the capacity to regulate, channel and focus your energies with awareness, self-direction and judgment. �Personal relationships can suffer, your health may deteriorate and you become vulnerable to looking for new stimulation from the outer-world sources you know best � maybe a new �win,� a new lover, drugs or alcohol.

And that pulls you even more off-balance, possibly to the point of no return. The extreme examples are Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" anxiety, career dissatisfaction, depression, inner life, marriage conflicts, psychological health, resiliency, stress

“Becoming Sane…” �Part IV

In Part III of �becoming sane�.� I wrote that our prevailing model of psychological health needs revision for today�s world � for outward success in a changing world, and for internal well-being.� I concluded by saying that a key to emotional resiliency and, more broadly, psychological health, in current times is learning to �forget yourself.�

So what does that mean?� Not thinking about your own needs?� Not looking out for yourself?� Not quite.� I�m using the phrase �forget yourself� to highlight an important capacity for health, survival, and �happiness� in today�s tumultuous, interconnected environment: the capacity to focus more on problems, needs, and solutions beyond just your own.� That is, the person who is too absorbed in his or her own self, own conflicts, own disappointments, and the like is much less able to engage the larger dilemmas and issues in positive, solution-oriented ways.� And that deficiency circles back to create dysfunction, damaged relationships, and career downturns.

Along the way I�ll be writing more about specific ways you can learn to �forget yourself� in your work, your relationships and your role as a global citizen. Here are some guidelines that help lay the foundation.

Three Responsibilities:

Think about your responsibilities as a human being living in today�s world, and on this planet.� Specifically, consider the following three responsibilities. They can serve as helpful guidelines for moving through and beyond the tendency we all share — to focus too much on our own selves.

Responsibility for your own mind-body-spirit

Recognize that it�s your job, alone, to continue learning and developing your emotional, mental, creative and physical capacities. Enlarging these capacities helps provide the flexibility and adaptability you need to deal with changes, good or bad. Don�t become like the character John Marcher in Henry James� �The Beast In The Jungle,� who waited passively, believing that something significant was going to happen�and ended up with a failed life.

Responsibility for those less able

Part of the new criteria for psychological health include this awareness:� You grow through your efforts to help and support others, less able than yourself, to find and follow a healthy path in this world. Find someone who needs and would welcome your aid, whether your children or family member. But stretch further, to include a stranger or those within the extended world community who suffer from lack of clean water, from famine, disease or torture. Organizations and individuals who could use your help are a click away on the Internet.

Responsibility for the planet

Reflect on the fact that your actions at home or in your community can help maintain a healthy, sustainable planet for future inhabitants, including your own descendants. Or, they can further jeopardize the environment they will live in. Look at your own actions in your home, your community, and at work. Ask yourself, are you becoming a �good ancestor?�

Some Steps You Can Take:

Loosen the grip of self-interest

Use self-awareness to observe � and contain � your Read more…

Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world, Work & Career "4.0" career dissatisfaction, common good, flaws in love relationships, globalization, interconnection, psychological health, resiliency, social impact, social responsibility, sustainability

Nora, 43, has a successful career as a free-lance magazine writer with two children. �She’s been married for 15 years to Ken, a media executive. �They’re typical of many couples today � committed to their relationship and family as much as to their careers. Yet something troubles them. It�s what�s happened along the way during their marriage.

There�s nothing �wrong� with it, exactly. But the excitement and energy, the feelings of connection and passion that were once there have gradually faded over the years.� �The old feelings haven�t exactly disappeared,� Nora says. �Now and then it feels something like it used to. But mostly it feels like our relationship has ‘flatlined.��

Another person, David, recently celebrated the eleventh anniversary of his second marriage. �He describes a similar shift a bit more sardonically, saying that his relationship has settled into a state of �depressing comfortableness.�� He�s thought about having an affair.

If these laments sound familiar to you, it�s likely because most men and women find that their long-term marriages (I�m defining “marriage” to describe all committed relationships, straight or gay) tend to head south over time.

Gradually, they descend into what I call the Functional Relationship.

Most people think it�s inevitable, but there�s a unique way to liberate yourself from it.� It�s learning to �leave� your relationship in order to transform it.� You do that through becoming �indifferent.�

First, let�s look at what typically happens in the Functional Relationship.� The relationship continues to �work� fairly well, but mostly in a transactional way, around the logistics of daily life: �I thought you were taking the car in for repair.� �Whose turn is it to take the kids to soccer practice on Saturday?�

Sometimes, it becomes more adversarial: �Why did you schedule the plumber for tomorrow when you knew you couldn�t be here? I told you that I have a meeting I can�t miss.�

But even when �functioning� goes fairly smoothly, feelings of passion or even fun just hanging out together diminish, especially in contrast to how it felt early on in the relationship.� As I�ve studied contemporary marriages in our post-9-11/post-economic meltdown-world of the 21st Century, I find that couples experience this diminishment in three main ways:

• Decreased emotional intimacy and sharing of feelings.
• Less equality in decisions and daily interactions, which are often tinged by power-struggles and silent maneuvering for the �upper hand.�
• And dampened sexuality, both in quantity and quality.

A note about that third item: Even when arousal is jacked up by Viagra or the new products purporting to enhance women�s desire, your libido � desire for the person you�re with � remains diminished. �That�s no surprise, because the latter is relationship-dependent. It remains unaffected even if you�re physiologically able to become aroused.

Overall, couples in a Functional Relationship report a diminished sense of connection with each other.� Sometimes it�s a feeling of not being on the same wave-length.

Most people assume that the Functional Relationship is completely “normal;” just a sad reality of adult life. Some are resigned to it as just one more part of the �long slide home,� as one 47-year-old journalist described his experience of midlife. Of course, not everyone feels so bleak, but many would agree with this woman�s lament about her 18-year relationship: �What was once a bright flame has turned into a pilot light.�

You, too probably assume that romantic and sexual connections are supposed to fade over time. Common sense seems to tell you so. After all, you�re seeing the same person day-in and day-out, not just when he or she is most attractive. �And like the majority of couples today, you�re probably dealing with the impact of multitasking, dual-career lives. Raising children in addition absorbs enormous time and energy. �Just trying to carry on in this uncertain, unpredictable world adds another huge layer of stress.

If everyday experience doesn�t convince you that the Functional Relationship is inevitable, there are the pronouncements of various experts. For example, some researchers claim that brain chemicals such as dopamine, norepinephrine, and phenylethylamine, associated with sexual excitement or desire, decline with familiarity. At the same time, oxytocin and endorphins, which generate feelings of quiet comfort and calm, rise. Therefore, they say, you are going to feel diminished desire for your partner over time.

Many marriage and relationship experts advocate just accepting this decline and learning to be happy with it. For example, in her �book Surrendering to Marriage Iris Krasnow advocates learning to appreciate and live with the security and comfort that come along with the �inevitable� decline � unless, of course, you want to go down the slippery slope of an affair, or dumping your partner altogether and look for a new one. ��It�s easy to think it�s best to stop complaining about what you don�t have and learn to live with lowered expectations.

If all of the above is really true, then you�d better resign yourself to the fact that a �passionate marriage� is an oxymoron.

But before you do that, consider this: Descending into the Functional Relationship is neither natural nor inevitable. �True, the experience is widespread. But most people descend into the Functional Relationship because it�s the natural outcome of how you learn to engage in love relationships to begin with. �As I wrote in a previous post, it�s a version of adolescent romance. Its features � like intense arousal by a new person; infatuation, often followed by deflation; manipulating and game-playing, are part of normal adolescent development. But we carry them into our adult experience. And �that model of love can�t sustain long-term connection and vitality.

Becoming �Indifferent�

Through my research and clinical work I’ve been discovering how and why some people defy the norm and generate new energy and vitality within their long-term relationships. I�m convinced that there�s a way out of the Functional Relationship. There�s even a way to avoid it altogether.� I call it the art of Creative Indifference. Read more…

Midlife Conflict and Renewal, Modern Love, Sex & Relationships, Psychological health in a post-globalized world adult love, decline of romance, flaws in love relationships, marriage conflicts, midlife, resiliency, sexual conflicts

Becoming Sane….Part III

In previous posts on the theme of �becoming sane in a turbulent, interconnected, unpredictable world,� I described why conventional emotional resiliency doesn�t work in the 21^st Century; and what that means for building a psychologically healthy life in today�s world.

In this post I�ll explain why many of the conflicts men and women deal with today stem from this contradiction:� The criteria for adult psychological health accepted by the mental health professions and the general public doesn�t really describe an adult. Nor, for that matter, does it describe psychological health.

A contradiction, to be sure, so let me explain: As we entered the world of the 21^st Century our definition of psychological health was largely defined by the absence of psychiatric symptoms. The problem is, that�s like defining a happy person as someone who�s not depressed. �Moreover, sometimes what appears to be a psychiatric symptom reflects movement towards greater health and growth in a person�s life situation.

But more significantly, our conventional view of psychological health is, in effect, a well-adapted, well-functioning child in relation to parents or parent figures.� Or, a sibling who interacts appropriately in a social context with other siblings. Either way, it describes a person functioning within and adapted to a world shaped and run by �parents,� psychologically speaking.

That is, we pretty much equate healthy psychological functioning with effective management or resolution of child- or sibling-based conflicts. For example, resolving and managing such child-based conflicts as impulse control; narcissistic or grandiose attitudes; and traumas around attachment, from indifference, abandonment, abuse, or parenting that otherwise damages your adult capacity for intimacy or trusting relationships.

Healthy resolution of sibling-type conflicts includes learning effective ways to compete with other �siblings� at work or in intimate relationships; managing your fears of success or disapproval; containing passive-aggressive, manipulative or other self-undermining tendencies; and finding ways to perform effectively, especially in the workplace, towards people whose approval, acceptance and reward you need or crave.

It�s no surprise, then, that many people feel and behave like children in a grown-up world. Examples permeate popular culture.� A good one is the popular TV show, �The Office.� It often portrays the eruption of these sibling-type conflicts, as the workers act out their resentments or compete with one another to win the favor of office manager Michael, another grown-up child who is self-serving and clueless about his own competitive motives and insecurity.

Unconscious child-type conflicts are often visible within intimate relationships and family life, as well.� They provide a steady stream of material for novels and movies. You can see, for example, fears of abandonment in a man who demands constant attention and assurance that he�s loved; or low-self worth in a woman who�s unconsciously attracted to partners who dominate or manipulate her.�Of course it�s critical that you learn to become aware of and manage effectively whatever emotional damage you bring from your early experiences into adulthood. We all have some.� That�s a good starting point for adult psychological health, but it�s not sufficient. �A well-adapted member of a community of other �children� and �siblings� within a psychological world of �parents� is not the same thing as a healthy adult.� Especially not within today�s interconnected, non-linear world.

So � without a picture of what a healthy adult would feel, think and do in the current environment, you�re left with questions but few answers. For example:

• How can you maintain the mental focus to keep your career skills sharp and stay on a successful path at work when you suddenly acquire a new boss who wants to take things in a new direction? Or if your company is acquired by another, or goes out of business?
• How can you best respond, mentally, if you have a new baby and a drop in family income at the same time that globalization sidetracks your career?
• How can you handle the pressure to work longer or do more business travel when your spouse faces the same demands?
• What�s the healthiest way to keep your relationship alive with fresh energy � or avoid the temptation of an affair?
• And how do you deal emotionally with the threat of terrorism � always lurking in the background of your mind � while enjoying life at the same time?

We now live within a world where the only constant is change, and where a new requirement is being able to compete and collaborate with everyone from everywhere about almost everything.

Doing that with self-awareness and knowledge of how to grow and develop all facets of your being � that�s the new path to adult psychological health.� But you need to know where to find the path.

Learning From The Business World?

Actually, I think we can learn a lot about what�s needed for psychological health from changes occurring in the business world. Read more…

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“What Happened To My Mental Health?”

In Part I of “Becoming Sane in a Turbulent, Interconnected, Unpredictable World,” I�wrote about why you need a new kind of emotional resiliency for success and well-being in today�s world.� Here, I�ll extend those thoughts about resiliency to psychological health in general.� Just as we need to redefine resiliency, I think we need to reformulate what a psychologically healthy adult looks like in this transformed world. �Here are my ideas about that:

Throughout most of the last century, adult psychological health has been largely equated with good management and coping skills: Managing stress within your work and personal life; and effective coping with or resolution of whatever emotional conflicts you brought with you into adulthood � and we all bring along some.

So, in your work that might include being clear about your career goals, and working your way up a fairly predictable set of steps to achieve power, recognition and financial success � all the things that we�ve equated with adult maturity and mental health.

At home, it would mean forming a long-term relationship that withstands the power struggles and other differences that often lead to affairs or even divorce.� You would assume that the healthy adult doest that via compromise at best, or disguised manipulation at worst.� In addition, you would accept �normal� decline of intimate connection and vitality over time.

But the fallout from the worldwide upheaval over the last few years have turned all those criteria of health upside down.� To be clear, it�s important to be able to manage conflicts that could derail your career or personal life. �But doing that isn�t enough to ensure future success, sanity or well-being in this turbulent and highly interdependent world we now live in.

Massive, interconnected forces within this globalized, unpredictable world add a host of new emotional and behavioral challenges to living a psychologically healthy, well-functioning and fulfilling life.

I deal with the fallout almost daily: People who�ve functioned pretty well in the past, but now feel as if they�re standing on tectonic plates shifting beneath them. Despite their best efforts, they struggle with mounting anxiety about the future of their own and their children�s lives, and confusion about their values and life purpose.

There�s the former Wall Street financial executive who told me he�d always defined himself by �making it through the next end zone� in his career, working long hours to ensure financial success. Now, as his company � and career � crumbled, he found that in addition to sacrificing time with his family, he had sacrificed his health: He has diabetes and high blood pressure. �Kind of a reverse �deal-flow,� � he lamented to me.

And the management consultant, pressured to ratchet up her travel to keep her career on track. �I�d been coping with everything, I thought,� she told me, �though I don�t like needing Zoloft to do it.� Instead of her career becoming more predictable as she gained seniority, her career propelled her into an even wilder ride. �Now I don�t have enough time for my daughter or my husband,� she said. �What kind of life is this? . . . My husband�s checked out, emotionally. And what am I teaching my daughter?�

Or the lawyer, who�d prided himself on �eating what I kill, and I�m a good killer.� He told me he has �more money than I ever dreamed of,� but also says that, �secretly, I hate what I do for a living.� But what�s the alternative, he asks, without �looking like a dysfunctional failure if I opt out?� After a failed marriage, he entered therapy and had begun to realize how his father�s unfulfilled dreams of �success� have impacted his own life � when suddenly his father died. �I�m in a tailspin,� he says; depressed and confused about what his own purpose in life is.

All of these people were on the kinds of life paths they expected would bring them predictable rewards. But counting on that linear upward climb is now hazardous to your mental health.

In fact, following that old path can make you more vulnerable to Read more…

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Why Emotional Resiliency Doesn’t Work In The 21st Century

It’s becoming clear that our understanding of emotional resilience – what it is and how to achieve it — (and, more broadly, psychological health) �doesn’t mesh very well with today’s realities. Conventional descriptions of resilience and pathways to mental health don’t enable you to handle the challenges and stresses we face in the 21st Century.

Let me explain. Resilience is generally defined as the ability to cope successfully with misfortune or traumatic events. Being able to bounce back from adversity and keep on going. What helps you do that includes, for example, reviewing your strengths, focusing on positive thoughts and feelings, learning stress�management, looking down the road to what you can manage better. And, by getting psychotherapy and medication when you’re unable to bounce back very well on your own.

Prior to the 21st Century, that view of resiliency and how to build it was more relevant than today. The adversity and disruptions you were likely to experience were more stable, in a sense. The world was more predictable, more linear, with respect to the kinds of stresses and disruptions that would occur – as emotionally troubling as they might be.

Most of our thinking about emotional resilience and healthy functioning, then, fits a world in which unanticipated negative events are fairly predictable. They follow a fairly understandable course, following which you can reasonably anticipate a return to some form of previous stability. In that world, wars eventually ended. The economy went through recessions, then recovered. You might suffer a career or relationship setback but could assume that there was a path to recovery.

That notion of resilience and the ways to build it remain an important foundation for mental health. But they don’t help so much when you’re faced with the challenges of today’s environment. That’s because the very notion of resilience and the strategies for bouncing back are reactive. They focus on responding to something that happens to you, rather than on what you need to be doing proactively, as part of your way of life.

Starting with 9-11, and especially since the economic meltdown that began in the fall of 2008, we’ve been living in a world that’s rapidly transforming beneath our feet. Today’s world is an interconnected, interdependent, diverse, unpredictable and unstable global community. And that’s created new psychological challenges for everyone, challenges that require a highly proactive mentality.

Without it, you might feel like the woman who consulted me recently. Even before she sat down she said, �”I don’t know whether to reach for the Prozac….or Prilosec!”

Her grim humor masked her “recession depression” and other emotional battering. She didn’t know what would help. I’ve witnessed that a great deal in the last few years: Career and financial worries or losses; the ripple effect of those upon family life; anxieties about what sort of future one’s children are headed into, especially with climate change and terrorist threats; and the increasingly polarized views about our government’s role in people’s lives. Research and clinical observation show that all of the above are taking a psychological toll on relationships, families, career expectations, and on people’s entire sense of what they’re living and working for — their life purpose.

Unfortunately, those of us in the mental health professions haven’t been much help with these issues. Most of us continue to look through the rear-view mirror at a model of resiliency and health defined by coping with and managing conflicts in relationships and the workplace; conflicts that you can bounce back from and reestablish some kind of stability…all while continuing to pursue self-interest, such as getting your needs met, your personal goals achieved, your “happiness” acquired.

But today’s world of ongoing disruptions, continuous uncertainties and insecurity has become the new normal. Seeking to bounce back to stability and focusing on self-interest, which we’ve learned to think is the pathway to success, health and well-being, isn’t the right ticket.

In short, there’s no state of equilibrium you can bounce back to. In this highly diverse, interdependent, interconnected world. �Trying to do so is a fast ticket to dysfunction and derailment. You can’t reestablish equilibrium within a constantly shifting world. But engaging these new realities in positive ways will support your success and well-being.

Research shows that you can proactively build specific emotions, thoughts and actions that are effective for adapting to life in the non-equilibrium world we now live within. That’s encouraging, because I think we’re evolving towards a new definition of psychological health via rethinking resilience.

The criteria of a new, proactive resiliency – maybe call it “prosilience – may sound contradictory because they include letting go of self-interest in your relationships and work. The new view of resilience emphasizes being flexible, open and nimble; being able to shift and redeploy your personal resources – emotional, creative, intellectual – towards positive engagement with others.

Resiliency grows from putting your energies, your values, emotional attitudes and actions in the service of the common good – something larger than just yourself. That’s what supports both success in your outside life and internal well-being. And in today’s rapidly transforming world, you need both.

In the future look for new posts about perspectives, research and actions that relate to “becoming sane in a turbulent, interconnected, turbulent world.” �Through them I hope to contribute to a revised and needed reformulation of what psychological health and resiliency are in today’s world — in all realms of life: �intimate relationships, career challenges, engagement with diverse people, and in our responsibilities as �global citizens.

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