Navigating Relationship Challenges: Are We Just Not Right for Each Other?

"For us, if this doesn’t work here, we just throw in the towel," said Odalia.

"We’ve been through so many treatments; maybe it's just a sign from above that we’re not meant to be together?" continued Kfir.

"Don’t get me wrong, we’ve really committed to this process, but in reality, it’s just not working," Odalia added.

"What do you mean?" I asked her.

"I know that my constant attacking and blaming behavior is my survival and destructive response. Kfir knows that when he disconnects and disappears, he’s in his survival mode," Odalia replied.

"We’ve tried so many times to change this behavior, and not only have we failed, it’s even gotten worse and more intense," Kfir added.

"I’d be happy to suggest a way of working that could create a breakthrough in your relationship."

"I wish! We’ve thrown away so much money on various treatments," Kfir said.

"Let’s first appreciate and be glad for all the treatments you’ve done so far because it’s likely you’ve gained a lot from them and discovered many insights about yourselves, and this provides us with a more efficient working basis in the clinic.

"Let’s try to look at and understand how the psyche operates, and why merely replacing a behavior with another one often leads to failure.

"A partner is just a trigger for activating the survival behavior, and most of the time, it’s not even intentional. Kfir pushes a button called: Threat. This threat activates a mechanism in you: if I attack and blame, I’ll survive."

"And Odalia pushes a button in me where I feel threatened, and then I disconnect and disappear," Kfir said.

"Exactly. So, one could say that if you already know what’s destroying your relationship, and you’re at a very high level of awareness, then what’s the issue? You can simply choose to behave differently."

"Yes, that’s exactly what we thought. You don’t understand how many exercises and efforts we put into this. It simply doesn’t work," Odalia said.

"The survival mechanism has been with you since a very young age, and you’ve collected so many experiences, emotions, and insights with it, and sometimes it even did its job and protected you. The problem is, it’s also associated with a lot of destruction. Every cry of distress for something different is a blessing. It means you’re truly starting to lose hope in those mechanisms. But why can’t we simply replace that destructive survival mechanism with something much healthier and more effective? Because when the psyche senses a threat to that old and familiar mechanism, it experiences a great deal of anxiety about losing a significant and existential mechanism. And what it does automatically is hold even tighter to that mechanism.

"It’s somewhat similar to what happens to us the day before we start a diet, saying: that’s it, no more chocolate! Our entire operating system goes into alarm mode, and we frantically search for chocolate."

"So what do we need to do?" Kfir asked.

"We will learn to observe that mechanism from the side. The more we learn to identify it throughout the day, the more we will gradually feel it starting to separate from us. The mechanism belongs to me, but it’s not me."

"Imagine that you experienced a severe cold in the world, and the first thing you managed to get was a coat full of painful, thorny spikes. That cold nearly killed you, so you had to wear that coat. That coat has already proven to be an effective warmth provider but it also scratched my entire body and caused me terrible suffering.

"But I feel that if I take off the coat, I’ll freeze to death. If someone were to bring me some thermal fabrics right now and tell me I could throw away my coat — not only would I not do it, but I’d hold onto that coat even more tightly and even build stories about how good that coat is, how it saves me, and how much I love it."

"And how does this connect to the mechanism?" Kfir asked.

"The ability to regard the mechanism as a coat is already a huge success. That mechanism is not me. This way, I can sometimes put it aside and try to cover myself with something warmer.

"It’s very important! I’m not threatening that mechanism. I’m saying: dear coat with spikes, I love you, thank you for all the hard times we went through together, and keeping me warm; I’m not going to throw you away. Occasionally, I will try to wear something else, but you remain here with me. This positioning will provide space for something new to emerge and relieve the psyche’s survival grip on that defense mechanism. It will allow each of you to respond to the relationship from a place of choice and not be triggered every time anew.

"Or according to the perspective taught by the Baal Shem Tov: Submission - the understanding that I am in a behavior without choice, and everything I thought was happening to me because of external circumstances is actually happening because of what’s going on inside me.

"Separation - the understanding that I no longer identify with this mechanism; it can be by my side, and I can distinguish between it and choosing a new possibility.

"And Sweetening - in this space, something new begins to emerge that can occasionally replace that survival space, and it could not have been born without this journey."

Hannah Dayan[email protected]

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