The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance.

Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and Amazon.com.

Patricia, you're dealing with some anger.

Yes, yeah.

What's going on in your life? What's causing the anger?

I'm married to someone in prison. We have been together before, about 10 years ago, so we got married in prison.

Oh, and wait a minute, you were in prison too.

No, okay, but you married him while he was in prison.

Yes, and like, certain things that we deal with, like it was fine, our marriage, oh my God, it could be like, almost perfect if he sits home. Like some things that he brings up trigger something, and I get angry.

Give me an example of that.

It could be about something, about being submissive.

Submissive? Tell me what he says.

He'll ask, "Well, did you do this? Did you call this person?" And I get like, because he's a person that's always… it's something he's always doing. Something is always, always, always on the go, on the bone, and go, he'll ask me to do something. And now I get angry, like, "Can you make this call for this, for me to do this," or whatever, or like, we're saving our money now, yeah. He'll ask me, "Do you need any money?" And I'll say, "Yeah." And then if I come back with a different amount, then he'll go, like, "What's wrong?" And then I'll snap. I'll snap if he asks me for, like, he asked me if I needed any money.

Right, and you say, yes.

Yeah. And I say yes.

And he says, "How much?"

Yes.

And you say, "How much."

And then I say, "How much," but I snapped.

And you say, what to him?

I say, "What do you mean?" I mean, like, "What do you mean how much?" I was like, "You're supposed to just say, like, 'Yes, baby, it's okay for you to have whatever amount you need, use what you need.'" You know, I just wanted him to be like that. I don't want him to ask questions.

What do the questions make you feel? If he says to you, "How much money do you need?" What is that making you feel like? What's going through your mind?

I don't know, because, well, me, I'm the type of person that I don't ask for anything, and it was a certain amount that I needed. I lied and said that I needed 50, but it was really 70, and I was afraid to ask for 70 because I'm a person that doesn't ask for anything. Okay, and when I asked for 70, it kind of triggered something. And I'm like, "Oh, why can't you just say 70 is okay?"

Oh, he questioned the $70.

Yeah, okay.

So here's what I'm hearing. Anger is the emotion that tells you that something is not fair. And here, I'm hearing multiple things. Why is he in prison, by the way?

He's in prison because of a murder.

He murdered somebody.

Yes.

Okay. And what keeps you with somebody who murdered somebody?

Hey, I got to interrupt this because we've got to pay some bills. Thirty seconds, that’s it. A very quick ad, and then Alan will be back.

Romance. Oh, I wish guys knew more about what we want from a relationship. Boy, I wish I knew more about what I want. Where's that ad I saw? Ah, here it is: The Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook. Download chapter one for free at SelfishRomance.com and buy it at Amazon.com. Hmm, The Selfish Path to Romance… that is interesting.

Okay, and what keeps you with somebody who murdered somebody?

Well, see, that's where people become a judge of somebody. We all make mistakes. I don’t, I don’t like when people judge. He made a mistake. We make mistakes. It’s just some mistakes we get punished for. Okay, he was punished for a really bad mistake that he did. He wasn’t right at the time in his life.

But somebody’s not living right now because of him, correct? Somebody’s father, somebody’s girlfriend, or somebody, somebody’s not living now because of him, right? There’s a difference between a mistake and harming somebody, and that’s important that you don’t have to. You’re not calling for that question. I understand. You’re calling about anger. So I’ll go back to that in a moment. I think this is something to think about, just some food for thought. There’s a difference between someone, through no fault of their own, who makes a mistake. For example, I could be driving my car, and the light turns, and I just for a split second I sneezed, and I went through the light, you know, and that's a mistake. I didn’t mean to go through the light, but I was sneezing and didn’t see it. That’s different from–

I don’t, well, God, I’m just… God forgives all.

Oh, well, you want to okay, but if you have that view, you’re whitewashing everything.

Could you forgive all?

But I’m not God. See, I didn’t call–

That's okay.

Yes, okay. So let me get back to the anger. Anger is saying that something is not fair. Okay, notice what happens there that if you bring up an issue where somebody needs to do some more thinking… I mean, if you are married to somebody who deliberately took someone’s life, that is a very different motive from somebody who made a mistake. Mistakes are errors, accidents, things that we don’t plan. And when someone deliberately plans to murder, to steal, to lie, to connive, that is in a very different category. They have crossed the line. They have violated the rights of that person, and they deserve to be held accountable for it. And when you whitewash it, whether it’s a secular version or a religious version, as you heard, that is not doing you any good. And then you may have some anger, and then you wonder why you have anger. My guess is her anger was way deep, that she made a decision to stay with someone who’s a murderer. I don’t know what her personal history is, but something is going on in her life that makes her choose to evade a major decision in her life. And then she gets upset because she’s submissive, because she’s afraid to ask him for money. Man, if my husband were a murderer, I might be a little afraid to ask for money myself.

I am Dr. Ellen Kenner on the rational basis of happiness. And if you want to be happy, you can’t get there by pushing stuff out of your mind, by shutting down, whether by hanging up on thoughts that you don’t want to entertain, that are much more serious than just the anger issue, or by faking that it’s not a problem when you know something is. So if you have something in your life that is a problem and you’re afraid to face it, be good to yourself, gently face the problem and start to deal with it, even if you have to do it in baby steps.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com, and please listen to this ad.

Here’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance, the serious romance guidebook by psychologists Drs. Kenner and Locke.

Usually, when your partner’s words contradict actions, the words are more alluring than the actions. But sometimes the actions, which represent the person’s subconscious philosophy, are more admirable than the words. Consider a man who has good character and acts in ways that he shows he values his partner, but who fears putting his feelings into words and comes out with inappropriate humor or passionless chatter. This, of course, is a psychological flaw needing correction, but the problem is not with the man’s basic values. Rather, the problem is his not knowing how to express his feelings verbally, and the fear and awkwardness that result.

You can download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com, and you can buy The Selfish Path to Romance at Amazon.com.