One of the primary themes at the Marriage Recovery Center is the concept of “Healing Together”. This philosophy refers to the concept that a marriage can only heal if both individuals do their part in the process. We frequently ask husbands and wives to do individual work in addition to the growing they do together. Men, this one is for you!
Your Foundation is Key
A man’s life is built much like house. There’s a framework to give it form and function (your sense of purpose and highest desires), it’s composed of many rooms (the areas of your life like work, family, rest, play), and those rooms are connected to one another by hallways and passages (these would be your core character and beliefs). Your life is wrapped in decorative siding on the exterior (how you present yourself in public and to the world) and it is roofed for protection against the elements (your self-protective strategies). Each of those is important and worth a discussion in their own right, but there is one element of a house and of a life that is more important than all the rest: the FOUNDATION.
If a house’s foundation isn’t built correctly, then the whole house is in danger of falling down: it can’t bear the weight of what will be set on it. The same is true of the foundation of a man’s life. So the question is, what is your life built upon? In what (or whom) do you trust? As Bob Dylan would say, “Everybody’s gotta serve somebody.” So, what do you serve? What do you worship? What do you invest your time, heart, money in?
For many men, life is built upon and driven by a fear of failure, rather than by a sense of their own value, worth, and purpose. Due to the wounds life has dealt you, you may wonder if you have the fortitude needed for you to come through in a crisis. All of those things produce cracks in your foundation, and they lead to behaviors in every aspect of life that will serve to sabotage you. This is true in your marriage too.
If you’re identifying with any of this, the good news is faulty foundations can be fixed. We may have to break up the old one and rebuild from better materials, but that’s doable too. It’s at least worth a conversation, and we at the Marriage Recovery Center promise to listen well. Please contact our Client Care Team to begin the process. We look forward to working with you!
