The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

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

This is an email from Ruth:

Hi, Dr. Kenner. I met this guy online in November. I like him a lot, and I got really scared of my feelings for him. I was honest with him, and I told him that I recently filed for divorce after 23 years of marriage, and I’m not sure I’m ready for all this dating stuff. He was okay with that. He offered me friendship. I accepted. Then we met in person two times. There was a lot of chemistry on both sides. Nothing happened other than a lot of smiles and stares back and forth. But it was so weird, which you can imagine, after being married to someone else for 23 years, to be out on the dating scene again. I’ve emailed him many times, and he responds right away. But he never takes the first step. He never emails me first. My last email to him was a thank you for being a kind man and thanks for your kind words. He said, "Take your time about dating and just be happy. I’ll always be there for you if you need to talk or if you need a big hug." But I have a problem. As much as I would love to be his friend, I don’t think I can, and I’m getting the feeling that I would be pressuring him. Can a guy and a girl really be just friends? Please tell me what you think about all this. Should I just forget about him? Ruth.

Well, can a guy and a girl be friends? Yeah, you can be friends and you can be just friends. There are guys that I know that I think are really nice, but would I want to live with them day in and day out? Hell no. Are you kidding? They have very bad habits, or we don’t share the same interests. You can probably think of examples in your own life of people that you really like or like a little bit. You can be friends with them, but you don’t want to sleep with them. I mean, that might turn you off completely, or you may even want to sleep with them, but you never would because integrated into the full context, they don’t have the right character, they’re not your type of person, they’re not a soul mate, so it would just be a one-night stand or something. And of course, that usually ruins a friendship. So you want to make sure that you know what’s going on here. What I think is going on here is...

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.

So you want to make sure that you know what’s going on here. What I think is going on here is a courtship dance. You’re out. You haven’t been dating unless you’ve been having affairs. You haven’t been dating for 23 years of your marriage, and he’s testing the waters, and you’re testing the waters, and you have that wonderful, electrifying feeling, that warm feeling inside when you meet someone who is a potential partner. Now he’s waiting for you to work out your fears. You’ve given him your context. You’re in the midst of a divorce, and if he’s as good as he sounds, and you’ve only met him twice, so you don’t know him fully, then maybe he’s just waiting for you to work through the divorce, finish the divorce and move on. What you want to do is some real strong, introspective work. You don’t want to be a mystery to yourself. You don’t want to have words like "weird" about yourself in your own vocabulary. So what is it about him that you’re attracted to? His kind words, his gentleness? I’ll bet your husband was that way when you first met him 23 years ago, or however many years ago it was. So notice that even though a person can be really nice in a dating situation, you really need to get to know them fully under many different circumstances—when they’re angry, when they’re frustrated, when they’re upset, when they’re anxious—to see if they have the type of personality that you can live with, that’s a soul mate. It’s fine to start searching this out. You may not want to do it while you’re in the midst of a divorce. Sometimes that can mess up the divorce proceedings, but you want to find out what you’re attracted to in this guy, what you’re scared of. Something’s making you scared. What is the chemistry? Name that about yourself. And he’s there for a big hug. I suspect even more.

I’m Dr. Ellen Kenner. When we come back, we’ll be talking with author Ann Fletcher, who’s the author of Sober for Good, and we’ll talk about alternatives to Alcoholics Anonymous and why it doesn’t work for everyone. I’m Dr. Ellen Kenner on the rational basis of happiness.

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

I understand there’s a problem with Gage Patron. See, yeah, besides the behavior problem, he won’t do homework, and his test scores are...

I’m not interested in any of that. I’m interested in why, when this school is on the brink of winning its first state championship in 15 years, you slap a crucial member of that team with a failing mark that would force his removal.

Is that how you show your school spirit?

You’re asking me to change his grade?

Now, think about what you would do in that situation. That’s from Buffy. What do you do as a teacher? Do you change his grade? Do you think, "Oh my gosh, I really don’t have the school spirit. He’s exactly right." You know, what difference does it make that his behavior has been atrocious in class, that he hasn’t done any homework, and he gets very poor scores? He’s failing everything. Should I pass him? Should I give him a C, or a B, or an A? And what will that do to my self-respect, and what will that do to the other kids in the class who see the injustice? And does it make Gage feel like he’s a smart person if I give him a C rather than the F that he’s earned? Is this the teacher’s fault, or is this guy just using heavy-handed intimidation tactics? And his real target should be Gage. It should be, "You know, how can you do that, Gage? You destroyed your chances of having a school championship. It’s not the teacher that destroyed your chances, it’s you. You behaved poorly. You don’t do your homework. You don’t study for any tests. You do very poorly in school. You’ve earned your F, and you’re getting an F, and you’re the one that’s undermined your chances of being on the team and helping us towards a team championship. It’s not the teacher at all."

I’m Dr. Ellen Kenner. You’re listening to the rational basis of happiness. And I mentioned earlier that I would talk about ambiguous divorces. Is it possible to be too friendly with your ex? Typically, you have the opposite problem. Typically people have the problem like, "Hey, I can’t stand my ex. I have to deal with him forever because of the kids. I hate his guts, or I hate her guts." And you just see blood when you see your partner. But is it possible to be too friendly?

Well, there was an article titled We’re Divorced, No Really, and it’s by Francine Russo, and she talks about an LA photographer, Mickey Kramer, who is extremely close with her ex. Here are some visuals. They hug when they exchange their son on weekends. She seeks out her husband’s advice about work and friends. She seeks his approval when she’s feeling down in the dumps. He helps her solve her problems. They work together on freelance projects. She’s a photographer. She calls him when she’s upset. She’s friends with her ex, but is she too friendly? What effect does that have on each one of them and on the kids? What implications does it have for their future? When you make your ex your go-to person in difficult times, you share times of crisis, you share the daily news, you share the news not with your current date but with your ex, not with your family but with your ex. You tell them what’s going on at work, you exchange daily emails. Now, this is not an ideal situation, unless you’re planning to remarry and you’re exploring that possibility. Some people do that. But imagine that Mickey is seriously dating someone, and she keeps turning to her ex as a confidant. If you’re the one that she’s dating, you feel totally left out. Why aren’t you the confidant? And also, what message is she sending to the kids, that mommy and daddy might get back together again, that there’s hope? And so they’re going to undermine your new relationship if that’s what they want.

So if you are moving on in life, you want to make a clean break. You can remain friendly with your ex, but being close friends like that is not healthy. Why would someone do this? Well, they may do it because they fear dating. You fear getting out in the world again, and at least you know your spouse, your ex-spouse. So you may not want to move on that way. You may not be ready to mourn the loss of your marriage. There are lots of losses that you’ve got to grieve, including the daily contact with your spouse. You may not want your spouse to remarry. So if you keep connecting with him and he connects with you, that means that he can’t date, he can’t move on with his life. So it will undermine any new relationship, and as I mentioned, it will confuse the kids. They will see the intimacy, they may try to foster it. You know the movie The Parent Trap, where the kids get the parents back together, and that’s not healthy. So you want to make a clean break emotionally. You want to make a clear separation. You still need to do the co-parenting if you’ve got kids. If something happens with the kids and you’re dating someone new that you really adore, then call them first. Secondarily, you can call your ex, but first call this person. The article talks about how it can take a couple of years to make this transition because it’s really hard. There are so many emotions that are involved with divorce. You’ve got jealousy, the fear of moving on, you’ve got anxiety, you’ve got some depression from the genuine losses that are involved, but you want to be able to move on.

So I recommend that if you’re in this situation, which I don’t think too many people are in, but it’s an interesting situation, just observe yourself. Observe the consequences. Observe why you call your spouse. Experiment with trying not to call your spouse at certain times and leaning on someone else or leaning on yourself. You want to be able to make that break for yourself.

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Here’s an excerpt from The Selfish Path to Romance by psychologist Drs. Kenner and Locke.

How do you know if your partner is the right one for you? Compare your present companion to people you have dated before. What are you getting now that you missed before? Are you missing something now that you got before? If none of the people you’ve met satisfy enough of your requirements, keep looking. If you recently found a potential soul mate, is there anything important that you’ve overlooked? Is your partner lacking something that you really want? Can your partner be trusted? Does your partner have traits that grate on you, and can any of them be viewed as trade-offs in view of better qualities? Are there potential sources of conflict between you that need discussion? Does your best judgment mesh with your emotional response to your partner, or are there still red flags?

You can download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com, and you can buy the book at Amazon.com.