One of the most common questions that I get is some version of “Why are all men (or women) like that?” The answer is that they are not. If all the men (or women) in your life are like that, that’s because you picked them, not because that’s all there is.
But you say, “Wes, why would I pick them like that? That’s not what I want at all!” And you’d be half right.
Think of it this way – we all have two lists. Our A list is what we want – happy, caring, affectionate, funny, supportive, etc. Our B list is what we get – moody, critical, distant, unfaithful. Why is that? Well it’s because the A list is formed in our conscious mind, and our B list is lodged in our subconscious mind. And as any student of the mind will tell you, the subconscious always wins.
Psychologists tell us that the mental image in the subconscious is formed by our childhood experiences, especially if they were negative. We end up with wounds that never heal, and because we were kids and don’t know any better, we think that the trauma was all our fault. So if we have a parent that’s very critical, we subconsciously look for someone who’s critical so we can be good enough to get their approval.
I didn’t say this made sense, but remember we’re dealing with a child’s mind here, and these things are very real to a child. This is why the children of abusers marry abusers, but it happens to all of us, one way or another. This summary is a very simplified version of the process, obviously, but it plays out in our relationships all the time.
Any repeating pattern you see in your relationships is no accident. It’s a clue to what’s buried in your subconscious. I’ll be talking about some examples in future posts.
