A relationship bait-and-switch, or evolutionary karma?

Editor’s note:If you have a question you would like answered and explored in this forum, please email Jan at Drjanseward [at] gmail.com. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. Don’t be shy — we’re enjoying what our readers come up with! — amanda

Hi Jan,

I married my husband on May 15th 2010 and we’re already separated! This has been such an indescribably painful experience.

When we met and moved in together he was the most loving, kind and patient person I ever met. After we married he morphed into a controlling, angry and out of control man. All communications went out the window. I tried and tried to make things work but got no co-operation on his part. His behavior spiraled out of control. He got fired from work for inappropriate behavior and attacked two of my kids (not physically).

It’s just so hard for me to accept that it’s really over. If so, what was the point of being married for only one year? Why would I have to have this painful experience? I loved him so much and at one time we were so harmonious together. I just can’t figure out if he was fooling me all along or if something happened to make him change. If I am truly meant to leave it in the past and move forward I must admit it is so very hard to do. Recently after two months of nothing but angry communications we actually had a conversation. He did apologize for the things I said I was upset about but there would be so much work involved to really make things work and I just don’t think he’s up to it.

Thanks,
Fugi

Dear Fugi,

Thank you for your letter. You included your astrological information (which I’ve withheld for privacy), and I know that if we looked at your and your ex-husband’s charts we would find astrological explanations for the surprising and painful ending to a relationship that seemed to hold such promise. But astrology talks about potentials and possibilities, and becomes more predictive in hindsight. We are left with psychology to understand how we participate in creating our circumstances by way of free will and the choices we make that determine our futures.

What I think you are asking is: Are people who they say they are, and can we ever really know? And, how do we accept and take responsibility for the choices we’ve made, recognize the destructive elements inside of us and others, and act in ways that will allow us to grow beyond our destructive patterns?

So, to look at the first question, can we ever really know who a person is? Are people’s personalities fixed and stable over time, or is the archetype of a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde a more likely scenario? Although your example of your husband’s ‘morphing’ from one personality into another is a dramatic one, it’s actually not uncommon. It is very rare that we present who we actually are in the world, for a variety of reasons. In our childhoods we may have been told that who we are, what we need, or how we relate in the world is unacceptable, and that to be loved and acceptable we have to be somebody else. This begins a process of hiding our true selves and presenting a mask to the world that will gain us the love and acceptance we require.

Later, we seek in others the parts of ourselves that we are missing in an attempt to become a whole self. Over time, however, we may begin to resent and to fear those qualities in the other person that drew us to them in the first place. Why this occurs has something to do with the ‘repeating to forget’ phenomenon that I’ve written about previously here on the blog. This is the idea that, when we’re made to remember aspects of early trauma we have not integrated, it is really, really painful, and we’d do just about anything not to have to ‘go there’. Seeing the split-off aspects of ourselves, the parts we were made to suppress, repress or smother, mirrored in another — our partner — can be painful. So much so that we rage against the memories, the pain and the person who we believe to be causing it. This psychological defense mechanism is responsible for the morphing your question has described.

Now to your other question, the question about yourself and whether you can learn something of value from the choices you made here, what can be gained from such a painful and confusing experience, and could you — or should you — have ‘seen it coming’. Philosophically as well as on a soul level, I believe that we make many choices before we are born about the karma we are willing to attempt to work through in any current lifetime.

When catastrophic events happen in my own or my patients’ lives, what ultimately must be explored are the aspects of karmic choice involved that contributed to that situation’s unfolding. This is not about blame. It is more about a commitment to understanding that the situation, whatever it presents, however unforeseeable it might have been, always contains seeds of karmic opportunity if we are willing to look for them. This goes beyond the adage that every challenge is an opportunity for growth. That is certainly true, but it is far more evolutionarily powerful and useful to recognize how this particular challenge, for you, at this particular moment, is precisely the situation that was needed to provide you with the opportunity you asked or wished for when you made the decision to come on board in this particular lifetime.

So, Fugi, I encourage you (literally “wish you the courage”) to continue your search in this painful experience for the seeds of your opportunity to evolve. Yes, letting go of the past and moving forward in a healthier way is difficult. But to stay in the flow of our soul’s unfolding, I believe it is the only choice we can make.

In the months since the situation has unfolded, I am wondering how things have played out, and whether your husband has been able to gain any perspective about his inner demons, the suppressed or cut-off aspects of himself that he longs to regain and recognized in you, and also what insights you have gained about your patterns of choice and responsibility.

You seem to be seeing with very clear eyes that your husband may not have the capability to do the work necessary to understand what karmic opportunities, choices and challenges are at play here. When someone apologizes not for their own behavior, but for the fact that you feel upset by something they have said, they are demonstrating a limited depth of insight that makes them poor candidates for growth based on self-awareness and self-responsibility.

I hope you have continued to find some peace and resolution as well as the recognition that this situation, painful and short as it was, was an opportunity to grow and evolve, and I would love to hear how things are progressing for you on your journey. Thanks again for your question.

Many blessings,
Jan