An acquaintance of mine maintains a policy of reading books at least 10 times in order to absorb the material. Although I don’t read books ten times, I do re-read them and in doing so, find new insights and items worth noting.
In re-reading the book, “Not Just Friends” by Shirley Glass, which deals with infidelity, I encountered a phrase that stood out. Although I’d read it several times, it never jumped out like it did today.
The phrase was “interest creates opportunity“. When it comes to affairs, this is a very true statement.
When you’re interested in someone, you look for or even create opportunities. When you don’t have an opening, you create one.
Although you may tell yourself that you weren’t looking for an affair, it could be that you had an interest and jumped on it. You saw an opening and used it.
Your mind focused on its target and began creating openings making it achievable.
It’s one thing if the opening was accidental, it’s quite another if you were looking for one based on your interest in someone else.
In getting honest with yourself about the affair, the interest was there before anything happened. The interest was more than just curiosity.
You can talk about being attracted or how the lover gets you, yet the bottom line is that those wouldn’t move you if there was no interest.
Your interest starts it all. What you’re interested in, you focus on. When you focus on someone long enough, your mind starts looking for ways of connecting.
Even without intentional planning, you mind works in the background for opportunities. Once you set your focus on it, your mind started working on it.
Getting honest with your spouse includes talking with them about when you developed an interest and you looking for opportunities. This may be part of the affair you’ve avoided discussing, even though it’s important that you do, especially if you want to avoid affair relapse.
When you claim being clueless about what happened or how it happened, you’re not being fully honest with yourself.
If you need help in where to begin your recovery, consider the video, ‘Help for the Cheater: Starting the Road to Recovery”. It will guide you as to what you need to do and when.
Keeping It Real,
Jeff
