The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com.

Now let's turn to the phones and speak with Liz, who has a question about trust and forgiveness. Liz, hi there.

Hi. What's going on?

Well, my boyfriend and I just broke up the other day. He broke it off with me because he doesn't trust me. Basically, we were together two and a half years. We had ups and downs, and he found that I was talking with someone on Facebook and put cameras up and all this stuff, and it wasn't very involved or anything, but he has a philosophy that any dishonesty is not acceptable morally. And I just wanted to ask you, you know, if there's any way I can try to earn his trust back because he's just, he's very stubborn, and he obviously still loves me, but he just can't get past the fact that the trust is then broken.

Okay, so there was no affair where you were. It was an emotional affair, or was it a real affair? Sexual?

No, it was emotional. It was done during one of our down periods. You know, he goes back and forth to California, and I was pretty much thinking of leaving him more than once. Okay? And this was just a high school friend who started talking to me and complimenting me and stuff like that, and he sensed it right away and put cameras up. And there was really not much that went, you know, down in these conversations, but it was enough that he feels he can't trust me.

Okay, so for you, it's a huge value that you're losing. You want him back.

After I lost him, I don't know if this is normal behavior, but I really, really want him back because I feel like I was taking him for granted, and I just, I'm just devastated. And I saw him today; he looked horrible, but he said he has to live by his values, and he doesn't feel like he can trust me.

So it's really up to him. You're in a difficult position because, granted, you've had ups and downs. It's that you're in a difficult position because, and here's the phrase that always comes to my mind in a situation like this: you can't force a mind. You can't force him to love you. You can't force him to come back. The best thing that you could do is to respect his autonomy if he chooses to leave. What more can you do? You can respect that. You can reach out to him a little bit, but not to the point where you feel like you're spending your whole life chasing him, trying to repair the wound that he's not willing to repair.

So go ahead.

Well, we were living together, and he asked me to move out. I happen to have a place nearby that I could go to, and he's very cordial, helping me get my stuff together. But he just said, "I cannot."

So the injury went very far and very deep for him. He basically said he could never trust me again.

Oh, okay, so it is possible that he has some ambivalence, which you're sensing when you're with him, yeah? And it would really be up to you to take the steps to see if earning back his trust is possible, and partly that takes time. I mean, you may separate, and I'm just going to throw out an example. It could be that you separate for a month; it could be you separate for a year. It could be five years, and he's still in love with you, even though you feel like you breached his trust, and he may want to come back then. So you don't know what's happening at this point. I can tell you a little bit about forgiveness or apologies. There's a woman, Dr. Janice Abram Spring, who wrote on this topic, and she talks about the following: tell me if this is a good or bad apology.

Hey, I got to interrupt this because we've got to pay some bills. 30 seconds, that's it. A very quick ad, and then Alan will be back. Romance.

I wish I knew more about what girls want from a relationship. Well, I wish I knew more about what I want. Where's that ad I saw? 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. Huh? The Selfish Path to Romance—that is interesting.

Tell me if this is a good or bad apology.

Sorry.

Probably not good.

So what's missing?

You know, saying what you did.

Right, right. So number one, in a good apology, is taking full responsibility for the damage you caused, which means you need to not do the "Yes, but." You know, I know I was talking to this guy, and we were flirting a little bit, but we were in a down time, you know, the minute the "but" comes in, he's going to tune out because he feels betrayed. That is all true. If it's true that you were both kind of on the outs, and you were thinking of leaving him anyway at, you know, I don't know if at that particular point, but then that's one focus.

So let me just go through the points of a good apology, and then get to something a little deeper. One is to take full responsibility for the damage you caused. This is all from Dr. Spring. Two is you make the apology personal. You don't give like a sanitized apology: "I'm sorry for whatever I did wrong." She calls that a sanitized one or a shirk responsibility apology: "I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings." There are grudging apologies: "I said I was sorry. What else do you want?" Or the guilt-inducing apologies: "Do you really need me to apologize for that?" So you make the apology personal. I can see how it's hurt, too. And you know, there may be some context. Maybe his parents divorced over a similar situation. I don't know, and I don't need to know, but you may need to know that context—why the injury is so profound. I mean, it would be profound anyway, probably if the tables were turned, you know, and he had done this to you.

You want to be very specific. You want to have it heartfelt. You don't want to be defensive. The "yes buts" that I was talking about, and you want to understand your own behavior—why you did it—and then you work to earn back the trust. And when in working to earn back the trust, this is only if he's willing. I don't want you to spin your wheels, Liz. If he's not willing at a certain point, you need to recognize that, and you can still be available and still love him for everything you love in him and dislike him for the things that you didn't like in him. You can't force his mind.

So you would want to move on for yourself and just, you know, make a commitment to yourself that this is something that may be something in another relationship. You'd rather talk about the issues between the two of you, rather than share it with, you know, an old friend. There are ways to earn back the trust. In the book "After the Affair: Healing the Trust, Healing the Pain, Rebuilding Trust When a Partner Has Been Unfaithful," there are low-cost behaviors and high-cost behaviors that you can look up if that interests you. And in our book, "The Selfish Path to Romance," I wrote with Dr. Ed Locke. You can go to selfishromance.com, and the first chapter is free. In the appendix, we have how to part ways and start over if you cease being soul mates. So that might help, too, and it might help you stay together.

So I want to thank you so much for the call, and wish you the best in this and wish you a happy romance in the future.

Okay, thank you.

Oh, you're very welcome.

And here's a little more from Dr. Kenner.

Thank you all for coming, and I think there's been a serious misunderstanding. I want you all to know that everything that you have seen in my theater is an illusion. It's a trick. It's not real. I can't bring loved ones back from the grave. I can't receive messages from the other side. I apologize if I've given you any false hope. My intention has only been to entertain—nothing more.

And that was from the movie "The Illusionist." It's a wonderful movie. I highly recommend it. And wouldn't it be nice if psychics and fortune tellers and spiritualists and their ilk, all varieties of these people who say they can hear voices from beyond, they can hear your loved ones, or they have knowledge about your future or your kids' future—they are all frauds. All of them are frauds. And if you don't have the sense that they claim to have, that you're paying them for, they don't have it.

Either they have all different ways of getting information, including googling you, figuring out, learning about you—things that you wouldn't expect—or doing what are called they can question you in ways that you actually divulge information. You can divulge information by wincing; maybe they mention children, and you wince, and they say, "Oh, I see something that's going on with one of your..." and let's say you've got a boy and a girl, and if you say, "No, no, I just have a son." "Oh yes, you just have a son. Oh yes, that's right, I'm seeing it more clearly now." And you forget that they got it wrong—that they got a miss—you just remember that they got it right because it's so important to you that you're focused on whatever it is that's going on in your life with your son.

So they pretend to read minds, and they're reading emotions while you're giving them clues that you don't know. And they can research you. You can read about these scams. You can look at Houdini; if you want to go back to the past, he's exposed many of them. And even more recently, the Amazing Randi—you can look up information about him on the web.

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

Here's an excerpt from "The Selfish Path to Romance," the serious romance guidebook by Drs. Kenner and Locke. Everyone you date gives you more opportunity to fine-tune your knowledge of what you want to avoid and what you want in yourself and in a partner. If you discover flaws that make you less lovable, correct them before looking for another potential soul mate. Put the past behind you. Don't wallow in self-pity or self-doubt or fantasies of what could have been. Don't pursue the unimportant or unattainable in your search for a soul mate.

If you have been rejected by someone you truly know and love, or if you have broken off a long relationship, give yourself reasonable time to grieve the loss, just as you would if a loved one had passed away. Healthy mourning involves reinvesting in your own life. In this case, it means motivating yourself to look for a better match.

Download chapter one for free by going to DrKenner.com, and you can buy the book at Amazon.com.