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A few months ago I was having a coaching session with Ayesha (not her real name) who had spent years ‘working on’ her relationship with her husband. But no matter how much she tried to convince him and twist his arm into it, she just couldn’t get him to change.
What she wanted from him was simple: that he not work on his phone when he’s at the dinner table, or when he’s watching the kids.
Her: “I just want a happy, connected family, but when he finally comes home from work, even after he’s had plenty of time to rest, he just can’t stop using his flippin’ phone!”
Me: “How do you feel about that?”
Her: It’s SO FRUSTRATING!!”
This was one of a dozen examples of little things that were so ‘wrong’ with her husband that they all added up to the point that she was seriously considering divorce.
“If he can’t stop playing with his phone, how can we ever expect the kids to not do it? And if our whole family’s addicted to wifi, and is constantly getting interrupted with Whatsapp messages, how can we ever be deeply connected with Allah?”
I can totally relate. I’m a ‘phone on airplane mode unless there’s a reason to turn it on’ kind of guy (which my family get frustrated about for totally different reasons…)
Anyway, after explaining the Inside-Out Reality to her, she was stunned (probably because she’s used to friends and therapists just agreeing with her, not calling her out), and within the next few days, some big things shifted:

• She dropped all her frustrated thinking about how much he uses his phone

• She dropped a load of other frustrated, stressed thinking about him, and the relationship in general (think: toilet seat up; drinking straight from the bottle; not paying attention to her when football’s on etc.)

• Her kids suddenly started acting a lot more cute & loving, because there was no more sense of tension around the home

• Her husband started using his phone less… automatically – even though she stopped nagging him about it

• There was more love & passion in their relationship

• She stopped trying to change him… and noticed that he started changing more, for the better

• She never even thought about getting a divorce again, because she now had a clear cut line in her head that lets her know when she’s thinking like a crazy-lady (we all do sometimes), versus when something really serious is up that needs a real conversation (which, it turns out, is rare for her).

If you’re fed up of trying to nag your husband into submission, and don’t want to be faced with open toilet seats, phones on during dinner, and non-stop thinking about how your family would react if you got a divorce… it’s time to upgrade your marriage with the Enlightened Relationships program. It’s included in The Ocean, which makes it a LOT less expensive than the cost of your local divorce lawyer:
www.mamoonyusaf.com/ocean