On unsupportive spouses and elusive happiness

I’VE RECENTLY BECOME MORE aware of clients talking about their unsupportive spouses. How does one make sense of happiness being an inside job when you lack the motivation to set that tone in your relationship?

This week’s question comes from Carol in Cosmocity: “Why can’t I be motivated by that loving feeling of when we were in love?

“We do not have children and money issues, but I feel worn down by stress from work and life. I really thought my relationship would make me happy.

“Nothing is wrong, but nothing is right either.

“Is there something wrong with me?”

It can be hard to set the relationship mood when it feels like your relationship is draining you.

How do you access the necessary inspiration that you require?

But a good foundation and a few directive shifts will make all the difference.

Your effort will be rewarded when this information comes at a make-or-break point in your relationship.

Our parents might say that you made your bed, and now you have to sleep in it. Not everyone will accept this advice and some will find an alternative partner.

Once you discover the same type of issues with your new partner, you realise that the common denominator is you. Is this why you are asking if you are the problem, Carol?

This problem of feeling uninspired and demotivated is more common than you might think. We crave happiness more when it is not found inside our relationships.

By now you have found that is not what nor what you do that makes you happy.

Add to the mix that relationship are not meant to create experiences to avoid or deflect your psychological pain.

How are you meant to be motivated, inspired and happy?

Some still guide us to believe that happiness is about making a decision to be present with gratitude for what we have.

But what if you have tried this and found that it is does not work – that there is a deeper structure at play?

This has to do with your free will and the reasons that you give yourself based on what you believe will make you happy, once you reach it.

Without free will and understanding that happiness is not an emotion but a state of mind, that kind of happiness we experience can not be sustained.

What lasts only for a short while happens because what you experienced is better.