IMG_5478Attraction is an umbrella word that I use to describe any time you’re in a projection about your hot topic. This could be lack of physical attraction, doubting if there’s enough intellectual stimulation, struggling with sexual connection, or criticizing your partner’s social awkwardness or idiosyncrasies. When you’re not attracted, it means you’re stuck in a projection: the mind spinning and ruminating on any perceived lack. You walk in the room and all you see is the physical feature or personality trait that makes you want to run.

By contrast, when you’re in clear-seeing, open-hearted connection both within yourselves as individuals and with each other, the voices in your head – the Checker, the Doubter, the Detractor – pipe down. As they are all manifestations of fear designed to keep you under the illusion of safety, when true and real love is at the forefront of heart and mind, it washes away the fear. Love is more powerful than fear. And connection is the outgrowth of love in action. During these times, you’re in the is-ness of your relationship. This is the ultimate experience of real love: not the infatuation of feeling madly in love, but the clear, positive goodness of oatmeal love. This is the grace of love.

In this state of present-moment connection, you walk into the room and see only essence. The perceived “lacks” and topics onto which the magnetic shards of your projections attach simply don’t exist in your field of awareness. This is what it means to see through clear eyes.

The burning question is: How do I find my way out of projection into clear-eyed seeing more often than not? One simple key is to focus on the question of connection and ask:

1. Am I disconnected from myself?

2. Is my partner disconnected from his/herself?

3. Are we disconnected from each other?

Sometimes these questions can be easily answered. Let’s take the first – and most important question – as an example. When you turn inward and recognize that being stuck in a projection is an indicator that you’re off-kilter inside your own being, you can quickly and easily pull back the projection and take responsibility for meeting yourself in your raw and soft places. Let’s say that you endured a significant loss last holiday season and these holidays are paring you down and bringing up a soft place of grief that lives inside of you. You may find yourself getting more irritated at your partner until you soften around the grief and meet it with your own loving attention. If you keep going at light speed and become caught in the fray of mass consumerism, your grief will slink away and the projections will grow.

Other times, however, the disconnect may be more difficult to ferret out and attend to. During these times, just naming that there’s a disconnect somewhere in these three realms (self, other, relationship), can help to reel back the projection and at least say, “There’s a disconnect. I don’t know what it is. Can we hold each other anyway?” The simple yet extraordinarily powerful act of naming and holding can bring you back to yourselves and each other.

Ultimately, real attraction hinges on healthy and safe connection. When you’re connected to yourself, your partner is connected to him/herself, and you’re connected to each other, grace and beauty flow like water.

It’s important to understand that there’s a trajectory to breaking free from relationship anxiety and projections. You may enjoy months or even years of clear-seeing, open-hearted connection where you’re in a present-moment connection and the projections feel like a far-off memory. And then, often around a transition of any kind (either external or internal), you’re back in the muck of fear-seeing, focusing on your projection-du-jour. The sweet and effortless magnetic draw between you has lost its pull. You’re not attracted, and your stomach thuds with the familiar disappointment of disconnection.

What are the transitions that can wake the projection-beast from what you hoped was an eternal sleep? It can be the larger life transitions: a move, wedding, graduation, birth of a child, death of a loved one, divorce, miscarriage, new job, new career, midlife, retirement; the yearly transitions: birthdays, holidays, seasonal shifts, an anniversary date; or the smaller, everyday transitions – dusk and dawn, waking up and going to sleep, hormonal shifts.

The distinguishing factor between relationship anxiety and a healthy response to falling back into a projection is the degree to which we take full responsibility for the projection and recognize it as a symptom that something is off-kilter somewhere in the tri-lateral permutation of a relationship (within self, partner in him/herself, with each other). When we recognize that when we are in an intimate, healthfully attached relationship we are in symbiotic relationship with each other, we understand how profoundly we affect each other’s moods and well-being. Add being a highly sensitive person to the mix, and we realize how highly and sometimes painfully attuned we are to our partner’s own subtle shifts of mood. We’re obviously most drawn to our partners when they’re in their highest, most joyful selves, but this can’t always be the case. So we learn, over many years of conscious relationship practice (and it is a practice that requires years of attention before any level of mastery is attained), to recognize these shifts in mood so that we can name them for what they are without falling into the pit of anxiety and rumination.

How do we recognize these shifts? We recognize them by staying connected to ourselves. Through a daily, anchoring practice like journaling or meditating, through connecting with friends in a real and vulnerable way, through seeing a therapist weekly or every two weeks, we learn to track our inner worlds. If we’re caught in a dark cloud, it doesn’t steal us away completely because we can see it, name it, and own it. Instead of projecting the cloud onto a certain physical feature or personality trait in our partner, we can come forward with vulnerability and say, “I’m caught in a cloud. I’m not seeing straight. Can I have a hug?” Again, the naming diffuses the intensity of our own fluctuating moods. The owning keeps us from falling into projection. The request for a support keeps us connected to each other.

Moment-by-moment, minute-by-minute, day-by-day, we make the commitment to turn inward and then move toward our own soft places and find the willingness to be vulnerable with the one we love. This is how we break free. This is how we heal ourselves. This is how, from a place of more wholeness and strength, we bring our full selves and our much-needed gifts into the world.

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72 Comments

  1. Good day,

    So by the above mail you say that whenever we have these running thoughts we are in a wrong relationship? I keep on thinking all these negative things but I am with the perfect guy.

    Reply
    • No, the thoughts are an indication that you’re needing to turn inward and fill your well of Self. The thoughts are alerting you to the fact that you’re needing to place the focus of your attention on YOU so that you can become your own source of connection.

      Reply
      • I’m so glad it’s been helpful for you, Maria. Would you mind sharing specifically how it’s changed your mindset?

        Reply
      • Thank you for your advice Maria. I am going to purchase now. As I have mentioned in another mail it feels like I am never happy and my boyfriend takes all the hits.

        Reply
  2. Hi Sheryl,

    I’m in a relationship with the most perfect guy, and we always talk about how we have such a healthy relationship. We’re even planning on getting married soon!! One day, we were out with some of his friends, and I hoped that my boyfriend didn’t feel self-conscious about himself, and that I’m only attracted to him. But then my mind questioned what it would be like if I was attracted to other people. Now, I can’t get this other person out of my head, and I’m constantly questioning whether I’m attracted to him, which sends me into a frenzy. I’ve been around him before and never had any of these questions before. It’s not that I’m not attracted to my boyfriend, because I am! But every time my boyfriend and I are physical, I picture this other person, and it freaks me out! I think they’re just intrusive thoughts, but they make me question my truth (that I love and cherish my boyfriend, and don’t want anybody else). I’ve also been diagnosed with Panic Disorder, so I don’t know if that has anything to do with it.

    I just feel like an awful person, and I can’t be excited about marrying him, when I’m so fearful of whether or not I want to be with other people. Somebody once questioned whether or not I love my boyfriend, which sent me into a whole other place of anxiety, but your blog posts really helped me. I love him more than anything, and up until the moment that I began questioning this, I never had any doubts about our relationship.

    Have you ever heard of this before? And do you have any suggestions? I’m hoping you don’t tell me that we should break up, because I want to spend the rest of my life with him! I know we’re meant to be together.

    Thank you!

    Reply
    • Of course you don’t need to break up! The thoughts about the other guy are classic intrusive thoughts, which I talk about all over my blog and in the Break Free Course. The thoughts have nothing to do with the guy and everything to do with your need to create the illusion of safety and protect against the possibility of loss.

      Reply
      • Thank you very much for your reply, Sheryl.

        Since we’ll be getting engaged soon, and will be planning our wedding shortly, which course do you suggest I take? The fear also takes forms in other ways too, like if I see somebody (attractive or not) I plicture myself in a physical place with them. These thoughts haunt me. I’ve never been like this before, and now I wonder if I have a problem. Is this normal too? I just want to be happy again.

        Thanks again!!!

        Reply
        • Hi Michelle,

          I just wanted to say that your not alone and that I have this issue as well. It can be so frustrating and confusing.
          I am currently doing the break free course. I can’t recommend it enough and I’m not even half way through yet.

          Reply
          • Thank you very much for your reply, Stef. It means so much to know that I’m not alone in this!

            I hope everything works out for you, and thank you for your suggestion.

            Reply
        • It’s all normal, Michelle, as you’ll quickly see when you join one of the courses. I suggest Break Free, but you could go with either one.

          Reply
  3. Hi Sheryl,

    Thank you very much for another beautifully articulated article. I completely resonate with the descripions of the feelingsa you mentioned in the article. I just registered for the e-course and I am excited to know more about the nature of the anxiety and the inner work I need to do. The concept of going inward is pretty new to me and I am not sure I fully understand it but I thnk its important as it comes up alot in your articles. I hope that I can learn more about it in the course, and understand the nature of projections and feelings I have towards my partner. Cause at the moment all my inner voice is telling me is the lack of full attraction and highlighting unwanted thoughts about my partner. Many thanks.

    Reply
    • I’m so glad you joined the course, Lili, and yes you will learn in depth what it means to turn inward. That’s what Section Two of the course is about.

      Reply
    • Many thanks sheryl! I did lesson one and it was great. Thank you.
      I have a question which is stuck in my head, I thought I ask to clarify for myself, can you say approximately what percentage of your clients suffered from relationship anxiety in their previous relationships prior to the current one? also in your experience what is the possibility of the anxiety showing up in the forthcoming relationships of the person with this type of anxiety? Thanks.

      Reply
  4. Sheryl, I’m really struggling with relationship anxiety and just signed up for your ecourse. Looking forward to going through it. I have dated about 5 guys and all the relationships ended because I was so overcome with anxiety and feeling that they weren’t the right one, worried that I was attracted enough to them, worried it wasn’t God’s will. I see this pattern in all my relationships and want to break free. I know that your ecourse is going to help but I wonder if you have any other thoughts. With the relationship I’m in right now, there hasn’t been a strong attraction. I enjoy talking to him and think he’s a good guy but worry that I’m not attracted to him enough and that he isn’t God’s best for me. Any insights??

    Reply
    • Since you’ve noticed this pattern in all of your relationships I hope you can see that the root causes live inside of you. I’m so glad you’re going through the course. Keep us posted on your progress.

      Reply
      • What if we haven’t noticed this pattern in relationships? I never felt anxiety before, and was only ever in seriously unhealthy, red flag-ridden relationships. This is the first healthy one that I’ve ever had, and debilitating anxiety set in three months into it.

        Reply
        • If you were in a pursuer-distancer dynamic where you were the pursuer the anxiety wouldn’t have been triggered. It only shows up in healthy relationships.

          Reply
          • Sheryl,

            Could you dive deeper into why the pursuer’s anxiety is not triggered? I joined the Conscious Brides eCourse earlier this year and found it very helpful. However, the one thing that seemed to be missing for me was the perspective of the divorced woman/man. I was married for 8 years to a man I had to constantly pursue, and finally left him after too many years of his infidelities and lying about other women (He displays several narcissistic characteristics). I have now been with my current boyfriend for 3 years and just can’t seem to “break free” from the feeling that maybe I’m just not attracted enough. He is so incredibly sweet, loving, patient…just wonderful. He’s also handsome, but not incredibly. Often I feel he deserves much better than me, because I’m consistently hung up on shallow appearance and personality quirks. I think a big part of this is that I truly adored my ex husband. From the time we met I felt I had struck gold, but looking back I know he never treasured me in the same way. The constant comparison of my feelings toward him versus those toward my current boyfriend are keeping me from the ability to move forward into engagement as we would both like. I know if I let him go I would likely regret it for the rest of my life. However, I just don’t know if I’ll ever be ready to say “I do” again without that feeling of head over heels attraction.

            Reply
  5. Hey Sheryl,

    I have been following your work for over a month now, and it has been of great help. I am trying to get my head around this entire Relationship anxiety issue but the one thing that always stops me from completely getting rid of my anxiety is the idea of ‘What if I am missing out?’ My partner is a beautiful man, both inside and out. And I feel awfully shallow for feeling the way do. I would love to marry this guy, but I simply don’t understand, why us as humans have to limit ourselves and our connection to only one person? Life is expanding. We have to meet different people all our lives, and if we ‘restrict’ ourselves from being intimate, both emotionally and physically, wouldn’t that be hindering our personal growth? I don’t know if there is any way we don’t let go of our current partners but have space for more. That’s unethical? But I want you to talk to me about it beyond the realm of right and wrong. Beyond what is considered ‘normal’. I have no idea if open marriages work. But tbh, deep inside, I want to feel fullfilled by my partner ONLY.I don’t know if this sounds so selfish, but I am so worried about. I assume I’d spend my entire life without living it fully. At the same time, I love my partner, he is godly. I feel awful and assume maybe it’s because of my childhood where I had witnessed a very horrible marriage of my parents, and used to tell myself over and over that I wouldnt get married or be with the same person forever. I want you to tell me that is possible to have a full experience of life with the ‘one’ person you love. Or should I be open to love as many? My partner wouldnt like that at all. I really wish I could stop thinking of wanting to love someone else. Please respond to this, it would mean the world. Just take out 5-10 minutes, Haha.

    Reply
    • I’m a big fan of committed, monogamous marriages, and fully believe that it’s possible to grow and heal with one person for a lifetime. Now, when you say you want to feel fulfilled by your partner ONLY, I want to make sure you understand that it’s not someone else’s job to fulfill you; that’s your work. And yes, I’m sure the beliefs your formed as a child from witnessing an unhealthy marriage are affecting you deeply.

      Reply
      • Thankyou! What course you suggest for me? I am thinking break free from anxiety first, and then move on to Weddings Ecourse/

        Reply
        • If you’re engaged you can start with Conscious Weddings, but if not I would recommend Break Free.

          Reply
  6. Thank you Sheryl!
    I’ve been following your work since anxiety hit big time for me when I was engaged. Now one year into our marriage I’ve been stuck in a horrible projection cloud for the past couple of months. I am trying my best to ‘own’ it as I work through the Break Free course and I’m finding the course immensely helpful not just in understanding my relationship difficulties but pretty much in understanding me and how I look at and interact with the world.
    I’ve been having a particularly low weekend and as I was driving home to meet my partner for lunch today I was filled with dread and lack of excitement about seeing him.
    He is truely wonderful and sensing how I was feeling he pulled me into a massive hug and whispered in my ear ‘This is going to be ok’ .. Immediately the projection left and I could connect with him. So Amen to your above post!! So much work to be done but I’ve found time and time again when I move close to my partner in physical intimacy even when I don’t feel like it very often the anxiety ebbs away.. At least for a little while.

    Reply
  7. Dear Sheryl,
    thank you for your post, I read your blog almost every day and find it so helpful. Frankly, when I came across your work half year ago it was like epiphany:)
    I’ve been struggling with relationship anxiety for 2 years (we’ve been together for 12 years). I was seeing a therapist for some months, but sessions worsen my depression and increased anxiety. We’ve been good couple, close friends sharing the same hobbies (my therapist suggested it’s not enough cause I can also make friends with other people). However, I’ve never wanted to marry him – the vision of wedding and marriage scare me to death. What’s more I tend to fall in infatuation with other men, especially those who are unreachable for me (the therapist said it’s because my poor experience with other men).
    My boyfriend is the most loving, supportive and caring man in the world, he really deserves all the best! Recently I’ve started to think that perhaps I’m not created to live in a normal relationship and family. I feel extremely anxious, confused, overwhelmed. Intrusive thoughts haunt me every day, I feel physical pain in my body:( Sheryl, do you think there’s always sense to fight to rescue relationship? Do you think that all people are able to be with in close, intimate relationship?
    I would really appreciate your opinion.

    Reply
    • Yes, I do think everyone can learn to be in a healthy relationship, but depending on your history and personality type it will be a fight to learn how to work with your thoughts and attend to your own pain so that you can reel back the projections onto your partner (especially the projections that it would be different with someone else or that you’re just not cut out for intimate relationships ;).

      Reply
  8. Thank you Sheryl for breaking down the sometimes painful complexity “you’re not attached” into solutions that offer more answers and peace by going inside, and sometimes going outside to our partner. I find that going into the depth of your words and images helps me reduce my anxiety and fear, and most importantly, widens my well worn path to new ways of being with myself, and a partner. Your words and images are most helpful.

    Reply
    • I’m glad the words and images are helpful, John. For me, it’s always the imagery that helps the words land in the body instead of just in the realm of head.

      Reply
  9. Hi Sheryl,

    I have done your course for 1.5yrs now (coming in and out of it), but unfortunately I still grieve my relationship every day. Every day is filled with disappointments and unmet expectations about what I had wanted for myself, yet I’ve also never had the courage to leave (previously due to my ‘biological clock’ and now we have a baby together). I am fully aware of how much I need to turn into myself, but this is the first time I’ve heard you talk about your partner being disconnected from himself that could also be a source of projection. I am 100% sure that this is a huge part of our problem, as the wonderful person I am with, is also the avoidantly attached man who has grown up in a world where men have to be tough and push down their feelings. As a result of it, he doesn’t talk to me about his thoughts and feelings, and pushes me away when I try to get closer to him (making jokes or getting angry with me). Also, he is extremely uncomfortable with emotional intimacy and always makes silly (childish) jokes when I try to be close to him (thus the only way we can enjoy closeness is in the context of banter and play, but this isn’t enough for me anymore). Despite relationship dynamics being the product of many factors, I know that these two matters cause huge sadness and anger on my part, which then result in projections about anything and everything about his personality and character (lazy, socially awkward, messy, ‘he doesn’t care about me or else he’d clear up after himself’ etc). However, I don’t know how to move forward from here… I don’t want to leave him, and I am more than willing to work on my own part of the problem, but how do you find your peace in a relationship where the other party feels so uncomfortable talking about his feelings and the lack of real, unmasked connection between us?

    Thank you so much for your work, you are the only person I have found in the field of relationship therapy that adresses these issues from your beautiful perspective.

    Love,
    Maree

    Reply
    • Hi Maree,

      What you’re describing is a situation where you benefit from the help of a couples’ counselor who has been well-trained in EFT (emotionally-focused therapy). When your partner is severely avoidant, it’s almost impossible to break through to a new level of intimacy without help. I encourage you to look here for a local therapist, or if you’re willing to work over Skype, please email me and I’ll send a referral:

      http://www.iceeft.com

      Hang on. Yes, it’s important to keep doing your own work, but often-times in a long-term marriage we do need support in order to reach the next level of growth and healing.

      Reply
  10. I want to say that each blog post “hits the spot” almost supernaturally (if you believe in such things). I want to testify to the efficacy of doing inner work. I also want to say that understanding what Sheryl is talking about FOR YOU PERSONALLY takes years, as she states. I’m happy to report that the more I connect to myself and understand my own emotional needs, the better I’m doing: I’ve been married for 12 years, have been in and out of the worst emotional pain imaginable from intrusive thoughts and anxiety, but have been able to get a handle on it largely through Sheryl’s work. I have bad days, but they haven’t turned into bad weeks or months in a LONG time because I know what tools to use to combat them. Today I’ve been projecting onto my partner but I’m not freaking out because I know why (I want him to behave a certain way socially, which is all about my own wounded self and nothing about him). I now know I don’t have to tell him about it; I don’t have to try to get healing from checking and re-checking my friend’s opinions. All that I need is inside me, and its exactly the type of control I’ve been looking for all my life. What sweet relief. Thanks, Sheryl, for everything. Keep writing the truth in all these different ways, different words that we need to hear over and over in order for them to sink in. And if you’re struggling, don’t give up. You can heal!

    Reply
    • Thank you for this beautiful, inspiring update. It’s so good to hear from you and I’m delighted to hear that you’re doing so well and doing the work! Sending much love –

      Reply
  11. Hi Sheryl, I love all of your insights and always find them so helpful to help me find peace and calm when going through anxiety in my relationship. But, sometimes when I read real life stories and hear of friends etc who seem to have such beautiful love stories..eg one I just read this morning on the Humans of New York blog, I wonder if I’m missing out on having a beautiful love story like these. My relationship with my partner began with doubt with him having recently come out of a hurtful relationship. We were on/off for a while, while he was straightening out his feelings…and since then during our 5-year, lovely, fun and healthy relationship we have questioned several times whether we should be together as a result of his doubt as to whether he loves me ‘enough’. I know he (and perhaps me too) should do one of your courses, as in my heart of hearts I know that your thinking is right. But there is a part of me that sometimes wonders why some people DO seem to have these beautiful love stories that I keep trying to convince myself aren’t real life? How do I know that I am not missing out on that?

    Reply
    • Keep in mind that you’re probably only hearing part of the “love story”. A real love story almost always includes pain, doubt, and even heartbreak – but those stories don’t sell! And even if those feelings weren’t present in the beginning of the relationship, they will certainly appear over the course of a lifetime together. As long as we’re in physical form in intimate relationships, we will have pain and doubt.

      Reply
  12. Hi Sheryl,
    My love and I have been in a funk for the past month and seem to argue about something every other day. We are both stressed out with school and work and extracurriculars. Also she is very forgetful so that is hard when she forgets about certain things. Any advice on what to do? I’ve had cry anxious spells which I feel gets me into arguments more and I’ve been extra irritated lately.

    Reply
  13. Hello Sheryl
    I am currently a member of your break free from anxiety course and have worked through nearly most of the material which has been very calming for my anxiety but there was one last thing i wanted to check. I often find my self having crushes on other men and wanting attention for being attractive to them; this is also whilst sometimes not being attracted to my partner. Is this in anyway a kind of way of putting up a barrier to getting close to my partner? or a projection?

    Reply
    • Yes, absolutely. Be sure to spend extra time on the projection lesson as well as the video on “the ex” (which also applies to other crushes). It would be a great topic to bring to the e-course forum when you’re ready.

      Reply
      • Hi Sheryl,

        I just wanted to comment here as I am going through something similar to Laura.
        As you know I’m doing the break free course also and I have been with my partner who is also a women for 4 years now.
        In the section about projection which i found very helpful and insightful, I also had a bit of a spike.
        I sometimes fear and think that I am projecting all of these negative things into my partner like ‘I should be with someone else’ ‘she’s not affectionate enough’ ‘ she doesn’t want me enough’ ”I am not attracted’ and so on, which goes back and forth as I’ve spoken about before between me not being sure to me being anxious that she will leave. And the reason I am projecting these things into her is because I am suppressing my longing of being with a man. This is the thoughts I have.. That this whole time even from when I was highly anxious and insecure and jealous of everyone she would talk to that the only reason I was like that was because I was angry at her for what she was lacking and furthermore because she’s not a man..
        Do you think this is just the fear talking? Another part of me desperately wants the projection to be about the fear of being abandoned and the fear of loss of her or the loss of control and lastly the projection into her because she isn’t making me feel as alive as she used to (which I know I need to do for myself)
        Just wanted to hear some thoughts on this topic it’s like even when I learn a new topic of this situation my fear will automatically find a way to still get in there and distort it..

        I also get attracted to many men and sometimes think of myself in physical form with them which can get very frustrating

        Xx stef

        Reply
  14. Hi Bella Sheryl,
    I love this blog! Thanks so much. I can relate to it, mostly about feeling disconnected. I have felt something has been missing most of my life. It all started since i was physically abused from my dad and bullied in high school. I believe i lost my innocent. I can honestly say to you Sheryl and everyone else who will read this. I am on the path of finding myself. I am a beautiful, caring, generous, honest woman. I do love myself first. My husband loves me and my life has meaning. I felt lost but now i am found thanks to you Sheryl, from the bottom of my heart. I will be 80 years and still thanking you. I am now feeling my feelings.

    Reply
  15. I Can Relate to you Angela, I was molested when I was little several times and my family was very unhealthy. I now have a wonderful husband who loves me and encourages me to talk to him and loves me and still I sometimes find myself wishing or wanted to run and I project it on the fact that I want to catch up with the things I could not have or do before I got married, but then I start thinking of how we have to move towards those feelings with love and understand that its part of my WS wanting me to run, its my WS not wanting to get close and I can feel that, I dont know why but I know its just to protect me and then I project it into my relationship, but if we always run from our resistance and we think we can catch up we will never really learn what real love is. So I am here fighting towards that which no longer serves me to face love.
    Thank you Sheryl.

    Reply
  16. I am pretty sure and convinced now that my serenity and clarity is to leave.. I have been just to afraid of.admitting that fact.. I am just scared that I have to break our home and hurt my loving husband. Here are same kind of signs that I had in my two previous relationships, which I ended and never regretted those. I dreamed then about separation and other men. I feel so depressed about all of this.

    Reply
    • Thank you Sheryl for your work and support. The truth really hurt, but I have to face it.. I have tried to pray, that my truth could have been something else this time. I blame myself and feel so much guilty about all of this. I have not been able to find and admit my truth before. I grew up with a family where it was not important how you feel. I have been a people pleaser and that’s why I have not been able to recognize or pay attention what I really want.

      Reply
  17. Hi newly married, im very sorry you had to go through that horrible time. Nobody deserves that.. Nobody. I am glad you found your wonderful husband. You deserve to be happy. Dont believe the negative thoughts if and what they come. You are not your thoughts. Thats what im convincing myself every day. I feel like i was washed out to sea and Sheryl saved me. To just me im very sorry you feel this way but are you sure you want to leave your husband? Do you think maybe you should give it more time. I know it feels hard for you.

    Reply
    • Hi Angela, thank you for your lovely answer. My constant thoughts and dreams about divorce are making me feel that I do not love my husband like I should. I have seen so many dreams where I have thought that I should not have married my husband and sometimes I have chosen to leave my husband because of my ex in our wedding day. Now when I look back I see that maybe my anxiety has been warning me that I am doing something against my hearth. I feel so much guilty and sadness right now. My husband is the most loving and caring person who I know, but I feel that I cannot change my feelings..

      Reply
      • Oh, I am sorry. Your comment was meant to Newlymarried.

        Reply
  18. I am confused…. I never said I wanted to leave my husband!!! I want to be with him…. was that for me? That spiked me…
    I think Angela Said the last part to you Just Me, where she says she is sorry that you feel this way that you want to leave your husband.

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  19. Your welcome just me.. I am only trying to help not cause confusion at all. Im not a professional only trying to offer support newly married…

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  20. I got myself confused between just me story and newly married. Muddled up i think. I guess whats important that im here on this forum to offer my understanding and support.

    Reply
  21. I got myself confused between just me story and newly married. Muddled up i think. I guess whats important that im here on this forum to offer my understanding and support.
    Especially im trying to support to people at once.

    Reply
  22. Thank you Angela 🙂 your insight is very welcome 🙂 lots of love!!!

    Reply
  23. Hi Sheryl,
    I came across an article recently (I wish I hadn’t because it sparked some anxiety in me) and this woman talks about how she was dating an amazing man for a year and he was everything she had ever asked for, but after a year, she got bored and said she realized it was because she didn’t love him and felt guilty because he was everything she’d ever wanted. She ended up saying that she doesn’t regret leaving the most perfect man and she doesn’t even miss him. When I read this, I freaked out because what if that is me? I don’t want it to be me.. but I’ve been doing long distance for a year and sometimes yes, I do feel bored and that our relationship has kind of plateaued. I don’t feel as crazy about him as I used to be and I’m scared that this feeling of being bored means that maybe I don’t love him anymore? Like sometimes I feel like I definitely do love him, and other times I can’t tell.. and it makes me sad. I’m signed up for the break free course, and I think it’ll benefit me a lot, but do you talk about feeling boredom in a relationship? I would really appreciate a response I feel like I’m going crazy here!

    Reply
  24. I should also add that my partner has everything I’ve ever wanted and we have an incredibly loving relationship.. so how come sometimes I feel bored? I really wish I didn’t feel this way and I just want to be able to enjoy the relationship day to day like I did in the beginning!

    Reply
  25. Thank you Newly married.

    Reply
  26. I would like to apologize if my story has spiked someone. We are still trying to take couple counceling, but I am afraid that if it could help us, because I am terrified that I have married my husband because of security, not real love, and that’s why disturbing dreams have haunted me so badly. I really care my husband, but more like a friend. I really hope that nobody has to experience anything like this.

    Reply
    • Security is not a bad reason to marry as long as there are other positive factors as well. Please read “Hold Me Tight” to help you understand how essential a sense of security is to maintaining a healthy marriage.

      Reply
      • Thank you Sheryl. I will definitely read it!

        Reply
  27. Dear Just Me, you are a good person and thats why you feel like this. You want to love and your terrified. We all here have our stories just hold on and know that if you feel this this if because your a conscious loving person and at the core of your heart there is love 🙂

    Reply
    • Thank you dear Newlymarried. I try to see myself that way, eventhough I do not understand why I am so scared. My husband is the most supportive, caring and kindest person.

      Reply
      • The last thing which I want to do is break our home and hurt my husband, but I am wondering if it is the right thing to do. This hurts so badly, that I have no words.. I want to give us a little bit time more, that I am completely sure with my decision..

        Reply
  28. Hi Sheryl,

    I’d like to ask something about something my therapist said today to me. When talking about my relationship and how my anxiety shifts focus from if I want to be with her to being insecure and jealous about her potentially leaving me.. She mentioned that usually when we meet people that are potential partners we don’t actually know if we are going to like them from the very start and usually we won’t know them fully until we are well and truly in that relationship and she mentioned that we usually fall for the way that person lives their life first rather than the way they treat us or make us feel first..
    This spiked my anxiety badly as I felt that this was maybe true for my partner towards me but not true with me towards my partner.
    I think our situation is a bit different as we had been friends for a few years before we got together with no intentions or any inklings of ever ever even thinking about being together. It was only when we got a bit closer that we started to like each other in a more than friendship way.
    I am always afraid that I only fell in love with the way she treated me and how she made me feel rather than actually falling in love with her as a person and the way she lived her life as my therapist said. If I look back it’s very cloudy as to what I did actually like about her other than the fact that she gave me attention that no one else had given to me..
    This scares me because I know that my partner fell in love with the person I was and the way I loved my life at the time but I’m not sure that this is true for me and it makes me wonder if our relationship was doomed from the beginning and if this is the reason I’m having relationship anxiety now..
    I guess my partner made the transition to real love with me but I didn’t make it with her after our honeymoon phase ended and now I’m not even sure sometimes if I do like the person she is and if I can love her for anything else other than the way she made me feel even if she doesn’t really do the same things as she did before.. I’d really like the feel that I do love her as the person she is but I don’t know how to or if it’s ‘right’
    My therapist always says that I need to make this decision based on the now instead of looking into what happened when we first started out because now is what’s important..

    Sorry to leave so many comments on your blogs.. Just getting frustrated with myself..

    Stef x

    Reply
  29. me and my boyfriend used to argue a lot but it never stopped me wanting to be with him ever. We got engaged 2 months ago and I believe 100% we were the happiest we had ever been, no fighting, no jealousy etc. But the last while I’ve had these thoughts of whether I’m happy or not. He hurt me in the beginning of the relationship, but we got over that and now we are very happy. So why am I having these thoughts? I’ve nearly broken up with him so many times in the last few weeks. Sometimes I feel like I’m staying so I don’t hurt him, but in my heart I know I don’t want to be with anyone but him, but my mind seems to take over. We discussed how our wedding will be and about having children some day and I was so excited! But now I’m always just so confused. I’m only 20 years old so people may say I’m too young to be in a relationship where I’m unhappy, but I don’t think I AM unhappy. I believe it’s relationship anxiety, the blog will help so much but when I’ve finished reading I automatically think “you’re making excuses for this relationship.” There are no red flags either! Help! 🙁 I just want to feel happy and not think my relationship is coming to an end 🙁

    Reply
  30. ps, I feel like maybe I’m just comfortable and don’t wanna leave? I always believed that being comfortable was a good thing, not a negative thing. But now I’m scared.

    Reply
  31. Stef, I couldn’t help but want to leave a comment on your comment above. I wanted to assure you that this is something that others (I specifically) have felt before, and that I really believe its just another incarnation of the fear projection. When I begin to think “My partner loved me for who I was, but I only loved him because he gave me attention”, then I have to use some common sense that may help you also: intelligent, caring people (I include you and I here) cannot be in a relationship with someone who is only giving them attention. There HAS to be more to it than that. The qualities that you love about your partner may not be very overt, and I’d be willing to guess that your partner is somewhat of an introvert and you’re an extrovert…but that doesn’t mean your partner doesn’t have the qualities that you need, and further that you (even somewhere deep down in your soul) see that you need, and therefore you cling to the relationship. Its been my truth that for years I believed this fear lie of “I was just with you because you did ___ for me”. I’ve since come to understand myself better, and I know that in my personal relationships I always used to be attracted to people who gave me attention. I still am. I think its just a need I have. The fact that my partner filled this need doesn’t negate his other qualities, difficult though they may be to see when the fear-mind has taken over. Hope this helps.

    Reply
    • Thank you for your comment yellow!
      You make a lot of sense. I believe that anxiety at this level can really make the past cloudy in memory and so when I look back to try and find answers or clues to why I’m feeling like this, I don’t get the full memory of what happened when we were first together so it’s really hard to judge it..
      I had a thought today that was if my partner never grew attraction towards me or never liked me then I wouldn’t have liked her in the first place.. I sometimes think of myself as naive like that. As in if someone likes me and they tell me they do it let on that they do then I automatically like them back.. I don’t know if I actually do this I haven’t been in many relationships or liked that many people to give a definite answer but it does spike my anxiety a lot to think of myself that way.
      I guess my problem is that I’m afraid that if I only entered my relationship because I liked the attention and the way I was being treated then maybe now after all this time I’m realising that the true relationship with my partner is not actually for me I was just blinded by the honeymoon phase of things and the attention I was getting..
      I don’t want this to be the case but it feels sometimes like its the truth that I’m not facing.. Hopefully it’s only the fear and intrusive thoughts

      Stef xx

      Reply
  32. Hi Sheryl,

    As I am sitting here, I feel a tremendous dark cloud over me, was unable to sleep due to racing thoughts, and was in tears this morning. I have been engaged to a tremendous person for 4 months. A few weeks ago, I woke with a tremendous feeling of guilt that this relationship was not right. I believe in God and I had this tremendous feeling of I have not been doing this relationship properly according to God. We are living together and I feel now that this not honoring God properly. Now, the only thoughts in my head are I have to end this relationship and start over fresh. The only way for me to be happy is break off the engagement and start over. I am having a hard time distinguishing if this is God talking to me or anxiety about the relationship. I was engaged before and had these exact same feelings and I ended the relationship, but God was not in my life then. Each day I am having to fight off negative thoughts about ending the relationship and being depressed and if there is mental slip up I fall into a big depression and think I must end this relationship to be happy. Is this a common problem? Which online course would be best? It is a constant battle to be happy. A few days are good then I fall back into a very negative cycle. Any feedback would be great.

    Reply
    • The depression and anxiety are yours, and will follow you you whenever you’re in a loving relationship. The message from God is to embrace the anxiety as an opportunity to learn about yourself within the context of a loving, safe partnership. Fear can feel like truth, and will convince you to run. If you’ve taken the assessment on this page, you’ll see that every thought you’re having is normal:

      http://conscious-transitions.com/break-free-from-relationship-anxiety-e-course/

      I would highly recommend you start with this course.

      Reply
  33. Hi Sheryl,

    Thank you for the quick response and feedback. It felt good to see your reply so soon. I will read over the link and the E-course. I want to fight this anxiety and depression. It is hard to admit that I may need help, it is something I feel I can control, but I am beginning to realize this may be a battle I am unable to do on my own. Thank you again.

    Reply
    • We all need support in this life, Robby. We’re not meant to navigate the tricky terrain of the inner world alone.

      Reply
  34. Hi Sheryl, this article is old but really interessting for me in these days. I’m afraid of beeing physical activ like doing workout or running, because when i do i’m always wondering if i’m happier with someone who is physically activ like me. And i also have these thought mayebe i dont love him, when i’m fitter then him.
    Is this also fear based, or my own not-enoughness that I’m not healthy or fit enough?
    Thank you

    Reply

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