“How do I know when I’m trying to fix him?” she asks.

Maria often forwards her husband relationship blogs, like the one you’re reading now. She’s admitted to it – trying to fix him. She knows it’s a problem. Yet she still does it.

Men do it as well. I used to be a fixer. But it’s more common with women. Maria’s complaint is typical for many women. He’s not emotionally available. A man hears this as, I am never enough for her.

“You know you’re trying to fix him when you ask yourself one question.”

Maria nods. “Go on.”

“You’re not going to like it,” I say.

“Come on,” she says.

“Are you trying to fix in him what pains you?”

She considers it for a moment. She looks confused.  “Can you say that again?”

“Are you trying to fix in him what pains you?”

I pause, allowing her space for the question. Her smile, often automatic, flatlines. Her head sinks. She looks distressed.

“Something registers,” I say.

A moment later, she goes off about how her husband doesn’t speak his needs, how he’s emotionally distant, how he’s this and that.

“The question was about you, not him,” I say.

“I get it but…”

“What happens to you when you feel he’s emotionally unavailable?”

“I feel invisible. Like I don’t matter. I feel horrible,” she says.

“And fixing him is a strategy to not feel those things,” I say.

She says nothing.

Maria does what so many of us do when we have a problem. We externalize. We project. We blame. We put it on our partner.

Maria’s husband may not be emotionally available, but she can’t change him by fixing him. She can speak her needs. She can get clear on what she wants. She can only change herself.

So what happens when she feels what she doesn’t want to?

At first, she gets scared. She contracts. She closes down. And then with guidance, she flows, moves past, even breaks through.

She realizes she can actually feel her feelings.

It brings her back to being the unseen middle child in a family of three siblings. It’s an old inner dynamic that she replays by blaming her husband. It’s hard to revisit but necessary to make change.

And unlike she fears, it won’t kill her. Instead, it will free her.

As she begins to feel more, she starts to see her whole self. The good and the bad. Her judgements about her feelings. Her judgments about her husband. Her childhood programming. The cycle of invisibility she repeats with him.

It’s not just about him. It’s about her. She is the lens through which she sees.

And as she begins seeing, her nervous system relaxes. Like magic, she starts to feel more at ease with who he is. Her judgements about him become less. Her painful perception of their relationship eases.

She even begins to see how he does see her. In the little things he does – taking care of bills, fixing the house, planning evenings out. And still, she may need more – actual verbal communication.

But through owning her pain, she aligns with her whole self. And in integrity with her authentic needs and identity, she is able to speak her truth to him – that she wants to see more of his heart in their relationship.

And so she speaks to him, without fear of him checking out. She models what it means to speak truth lovingly. She invites him to meet her in conversation.

And when she does, something changes. Something different from when she tries to fix him.

Suddenly he is emotionally available. He is listening, seeing her. No longer defending himself, no longer “checked out.”

Something big changes when she owns her feelings. She can approach her own invisibility with self-compassion. And extend that compassion to him.

He is not the problem. He merely reflects it back to her.

To arrive at this place, I encourage her to ask:

• What is my part in our dynamic?
• How do I abdicate from seeing it?
• How do I outsource “seeing myself” to him?

This is personal empowerment, at its most basic.  It applies to women and men. Own within you what pains you in your partner.

When you do, you close the gap between you and you. You no longer give yourself away to the other, mistaking that for love.

Instead, you live love as…

… feeling hard feelings in order to love yourself.
… being a better you – all of you — to be a better partner.
… going within to see what’s your “stuff” and what is your partner’s.
… transforming your relational challenges into relational superpowers.

Become a relational samurai. In 4 weeks, I’ll show you how. Just say “Relational Samurai” to get details.

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