One of the oddities I encountered while in graduate school was “ABD’s”. An “ABD” is someone who has done all the work needed for obtaining their doctoral degree except the dissertation (ABD=All But Dissertation).
What made “ABD’s” strange is that they completed all the work, yet stopped right before the final task. Many actually drop out of college at that point. It just blew my mind considering all the work they did only to drop out right before graduating.
I finally solved the mystery of ‘ABD’s’ when I learned about the ‘fear of success’. As odd as it sounds there are people who talk about success, yet actually fear it.
Success scares them so much, they sabotage any chance of success in their life. For them, success brings fears. They’re capable of it, but are scared of what success brings with it.
I’ve also seen a same ‘fear of success’ in affair recovery. You may be one of those who fear having a successful marriage.
You want a successful marriage, yet are terrified of it failing once you reach that point.
One of the hallmarks of this fear of success is the inability to receive. One sure way of keeping your marriage sick is the inability to receive.
Being unable to receive from others, whether it be gifts, love or emotional intimacy stifles your chances of success.
That inability keeps your marriage in a sick place. It keeps the two of you in a state of unhealthy relationship.
Affairs are another one of the ways some cheaters avoid successful marriages. Like the ABD’s, they do something that throws a monkey wrench in their relationships.
They gravitate toward the unhealthy since healthy relationships scare them. The affair is used as a way of keeping their marriage from being successful.
With unhealthy relationships, they feel more secure. This is especially true when the cheater comes from a dysfunctional family. They are so accustomed to dysfunction, that healthy relationships scare them.
In the downloadable “Affair Recovery Workshop“, I address what you can do in changing dysfunctional family patterns. Those old unhealthy patterns are impacting your marriage more than you realize.
Those old patterns and fears they create can be changed. In the workshop, I’ll guide you through the sequence you need in making those changes happen. Tackling the family patterns and fears they create in the wrong order makes the situation worse.
Going through affair recovery in the right sequence does make a difference in whether you make the situation better or worse. You may be sabotaging your own success.
Keeping It Real,
Jeff
