Dear Jack, I do hope you don’t mind the truth, ‘cause I’m going to say some very hard truth in this letter. Think of a fluffy whiff of cloud hanging between heaven and earth. That’s how your life is right now. You’re just hung there, not moving forward or backward – Just an eccentric piece of the mechanical vagaries nature. There’s a form to your marriage, just like the cloud. Yet the marriage has no form. Continue reading
My dear Jil, I feel I need to write you once more about that “f” word – forgiveness. Forgiveness is a hard thing no doubt, and yet it’s the easiest of things. Forgiveness is only hard when we regurgitate and re-experience the pain and the trauma visited on us. Memory loss, and the willingness to have memory loss are critical to forgiveness. There are experiences that should not be relived. Every time you recall a painful experience it’s like peeling the scab on a wound. Continue reading
My dear Jack, in every relationship there are specialties. The problem is, we’ve historically defined those specialties along sexist lines instead of extant capacities. Each party is better than the other party in some things, and less capable than the other in other things. It’s wise to understand what you’re good at, and what your partner is better at. And vice versa. Continue reading
Dear Jil, you don’t pay back a man’s financial outlay on you with your life. You pay back with money if you must. Like for like. This man wasn’t generous to you because he wanted to do charity; he was generous because he fell in love. Every act of generosity to you was predicated on his love for you. And he got something back in return – your consideration. Continue reading
My dear Jack, you’ve got to be careful not to buy into the culture of grand deceit now prevalent in relationships. By grand deceit I mean dating a girl and giving her the impression you will marry her, but planning another wedding. In one or two cases there was even a family introduction, but no plan whatsoever to marry the girl. Just deceit. Continue reading
My dear Jil, do you know Elizabeth Moss? You probably know her as Peggy, Peggy Olson in the Mad Men drama series. In the series she’s the former secretary who ended up as advertising executive, breaking the glass ceiling for women. She made one major mistake – had a child for a married man, eventually giving up the child for adoption. But she didn’t allow the mistake to define her. She somehow pulled through. Continue reading
Dear Jack, what I’m trying so hard to help you avoid is the “20year Mistake.” You see, there are some relationship mistakes we make in life that take twenty years to get out of. I know it sounds incredible but it’s the truth. Continue reading
My dear Jil, there are relationships that can’t be however you try. Everything will seem so perfect, seem so right and yet for some reason the relationship just can’t be. It’s something like the way magnets repel each other. You push and push but they surreally just can’t come together. Continue reading
My dear Jack, don’t play with little things in your marriage. It’s the little things that are dangerous. We don’t pay enough attention to dangerous clues – the little big things that matter to our spouses. Continue reading
My dear Jil, when heads clash in a relationship, the heart can’t mesh, and that’s the problem you’ve been having in your relationship. There’s stubborn willfulness on both sides, more especially yours. So even though both of you are individually wonderful, there is a clash of personalities and clash of wills. Continue reading