Said Terry Real — who's "personally healed" Bruce Springsteen and Bradley Cooper — quoted in "Have you got ‘marital hatred’? Probably/He’s the couples therapist to the A-list who says it’s normal to have some (very) dark thoughts about your spouse. Terry Real talks to Andrew Billen" (London Times).
“I teach my students to always be respectful of the exquisite intelligence of the adaptive child. You did exactly what you needed to do back then to preserve yourself but I have a saying, ‘adaptive then, maladaptive now’. You’re not that little girl and you’re not dealing with your histrionic mother. You’re dealing with your husband. Things are different.”
He has been married for 37 lively years to Belinda Berman-Real, who is also a therapist. With two sons now in their thirties, they have always rowed. One 12-hour fight was resolved by her saying forgivingly: “You really are an asshole.”...
“Belinda’s core negative image of me is that I am an undependable, self-centred, charming, narcissistic boy. My core negative image of her is that she is a controlling, insatiable, complaining witch.”...
When he is not blaming our adaptive inner children, he tends to blame broken marriages on the West’s cult of individualism. Born somewhere back in the Enlightenment, it has, he contends, produced since the 1950s a society of “rugged individuals” (largely domineering men) and “romantic individuals” (mainly women who big up their feelings). Such “grandiosity” is as poisonous as low self-esteem....
“Generally speaking, grandiose women are even more difficult to treat than grandiose men, not always but quite often. Grandiose women have advanced degrees in offending from the victim position,” he writes. Such women, he goes on, can be “righteously indignant avenging angels”....
"When women move out of the traditional feminine role and move into the traditional masculine role, they don’t do a better job with it than men have.... You break connection when you move into power. You see this with women these days. A lot of women when they finally do find their voice to speak do so in a manner that no one in their right mind could possibly listen to. I think the next step for culture is moving into — and I teach this practically — how to stand up to your partner and cherish your partner and love them in the same breath. Now, that’s brand new for the culture.... I’m not interested in feminising men. I’m not interested in masculinising women. I think that we should raise our sons and daughters to be whole human beings. I like to think about smart, sexy, beautiful daughters and big-hearted, sensitive, strong sons."
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Some lucky people get to that good balance in a marital relationship instinctively. I found this excerpt very interesting and the final paragraph particularly insightful. Ha, at first, I wrote "inciteful" and thought, "oh, that'd be a joke on me not to have caught that mistake."
H's not entirely wrong, but he needs an editor. Maybe that will be the next "helping profession" -- "life editors" to help people assemble the jumble of thoughts that is in their heads.
Was his birth name really "Terry Real"? Will Real Marriage® become a registered trademark?
"Generally speaking, grandiose women are even more difficult to treat than grandiose men, not always but quite often. Grandiose women have advanced degrees in offending from the victim position,” he writes. Such women, he goes on, can be “righteously indignant avenging angels”
Generally speaking, women love grandiose men. They'll work overtime trying to deny it, but it's true.
Several months ago the sig other said to me - "You're such an asshole." To which I replied - "But other than that..."
I think the next step for culture is moving into — and I teach this practically — how to stand up to your partner and cherish your partner and love them in the same breath. Now, that’s brand new for the culture....
And then he'll invent the wheel and we'll all live happily ever after.
Those excerpts sounds about right.
Been married coming up on 17 years, with 3 children under 10.
One of the best things we did was right as we were close to seperating, we decided to build a house. From scratch (i.e. not a spec home, a real blank page house build). During COVID supply chain crisis.
Doing pretty well today and the new house is a dream.
I think the next step for culture is moving into — and I teach this practically — how to stand up to your partner and cherish your partner and love them in the same breath. Now, that’s brand new for the culture....
Grandiose psychologists are even more difficult to treat than grandiose women.
Kinda makes some sense, to me.
I started watching The Komisky Method yesterday. They were going to practice something- ohhh… they were relaxing. One kid was having a tough time &Kominsky says: you look like you’re having a seizure. Kid says- it’s difficult for me to relax b/c I had an abusive childhood. The reply: you’re not a kid anymore… relax.
The boys, girls, and their therapists who refuse to grow up.
Selection bias.
He's the therapist to the A-list. Grandiosity is the price of admission.
Grandiose psychologists are even more difficult to treat than grandiose women.
Touché, BobBoyd!
I started out hating this guy but by the end had to admit that SOME of what he said seems to have been borne out in my almost-30-year, 3-kid marriage. However, what I will not do is call my husband an a-hole out loud, except as a joke, and what he will not do is call me a b*tch out loud, except as a joke. Harsh insults in the middle of a fight never get forgotten, in my experience (I was married for two years, very young, before my now husband, and I still remember some of those fights).
Real's book "Us" is a big best seller. Here's the Amazon link if you want to buy it AND (without paying more) make a contribution to this blog.
At that link, you'll see that it's published by GOOP, and there are quotes from famous people, including this from Bruce Springsteen: "“A beautiful and important book, particularly for the moment we are in."
Why "particularly for the moment we are in"? Covid? Trump? Inflation? I have no idea.
"However, what I will not do is call my husband an a-hole out loud, except as a joke...."
Notice that he says she said "You really are an asshole" "forgivingly."
What does that even mean? She didn't say he acted like an asshole that one time or he has been an asshole or behaved like an asshole. She spoke generally and in the present tense. So where is forgiveness? Could it be that assholery is inborn and permanent and some people are just assholes and it's like being low IQ or blind — just a disability that you have to deal with the best you can?
Getting very strong "Warren Beatty as the hairdresser guy in that 70s movie 'Shampoo' (or whatever it was called)" vibes from this Real dude.
Now I want to go listen to "Gone Hollywood" by Supertramp.
"Real marriage comes the day you realise that this person [your spouse] is exquisitely designed to stick the burning spear right into your eyeball..."
...wearing a vegan leather harness.
Notice that he says she said "You really are an asshole" "forgivingly."
So where is forgiveness?
The forgiveness was in her body language.
She said it just as she was pointing her soles at the ceiling.
Rookie. 37 years--still a kid. He is right that in a long marriage (we've been married 57 years now) you learn how to push each other's buttons. I wouldn't call it a flaming spear to the eyeball but there are buttons. Relationship wisdom comes when you learn when, or if, to push a button.
I would guess that fame is an aggravating factor when it comes to grandiose behavior. Money maybe, but, like alcohol, it's both a cure and a cause....It helps to hire a couples' therapist who specializes in the marital problems of the rich and the famous. I would urge all rich and famous people to go to them prior to divorce. I'm not so sure if this advice works with poor people. Poverty is an aggravating factor when you're trying to shake off maladaptive behavior. Financial success gives you self confidence in other areas of behavior. Bankruptcy and poverty not so much. If you're going broke it's probably that bitch's fault or, alternately, that asshole simply will not listen to reason.
We have thrown courtesy overboard as being "conservative" and old-fashioned but this is a problem for marriage. It is NOT helpful to blurt out whatever is on your mind. Keep that mean thought to yourself. Especially when angry.
Another problem is unrealistic expectations. People are slobs, clumsy, selfish, absent-minded. All these things are annoying but that is the human condition. The Hollywood image of Happy-ever-after is not realistic at all. The solution is NOT to demand perfection from your spouse, but to up your tolerance for imperfection. You have more control over yourself than over them.
When I find myself in an argument with my spouse, I recall a moment of incandescent insight from early in my marriage. I recall thinking, as a disagreement with my spouse got underway, "She's not going anywhere. When you say what you're thinking, you'll have to live with her reaction to it." Be nice.
I've half joked that "pre-marriage" counseling should just be having to spend two weeks in a Church owned house, and while there do a remodel project and a car repair project together, and at the end host a dinner party.
Why does it take a therapist to tell people what they already know?
Harsh insults in the middle of a fight never get forgotten, in my experience (I was married for two years, very young, before my now husband, and I still remember some of those fights).
Being called an asshole doesn't strike me as a particularly harsh insult. Perhaps that's why he described that as "forgivingly" since she could have said far worse....cocksucker, mf'er, teabagger, cockholster, fegeleh, monster, paedo.....and let's not overlook MAGAhatter.
Yeah, that would leave a mark.
- Krumhorn
Hey Mikey, a wise sage once said “When I find myself in times of trouble mother Mary comes to me speaking words of wisdom let it be”
"Real marriage comes the day you realise that this person [your spouse] is exquisitely designed to stick the burning spear right into your eyeball..."
Channeling current Scott Adams.
“A beautiful and important book, particularly for the moment we are in."
Aren't we always in the moment we're in? (Indeed, how could we not be...?)
This is such a beautiful and important moment to me.
My wife and I have very different styles of conversation and argument. She takes after her mother in blurting out whatever she is thinking, often with passion, but I'm very circumspect and store up ammo to unload all at once after a lot of provocation.
The other big difference is that I see the world accurately.
Happy wife, happy life.
I have found the more attention I pay to my wife, the more time I have for myself.
Until I discovered that, I was always 'stealing', me time.
Now I don't have to, and we are both more content.
Oh, 41...and a half, years
iowa2, good advice
My insight is that I would have fights and relationship problems with anyone. It's unavoidable. Therefore, are my problems now the problems I'd have with anyone I unique to my spouse?
It's almost always something I would fight about with anyone.
Therefore, the problem is probably caused by me.
Not always, but this insight got me to think before I escalate a disagreement. I am very likely wrong!
Yet nobody wants to try to figure out the biblical order hierarchy of creation; God, man, woman, child, animal, earth. It is as if asking, what did God know and when did He know it are off limits out of the gate as if the worldview was coming straight off the presses of the Babylon Bee. And yet the lesson is smacking us in the face, begging us to be at least inquisitive.
>>One 12-hour fight was resolved by her saying forgivingly: “You really are an asshole.”...
Everyone is like "where's the forgiveness?". It goes with the acceptance- something you can do with imperfections, acknowledge, accept and forgive them. Your partner doesn't need to be perfect and you don't *need* to try to control every last detail about them, rub their nose in all their flaws until you break them to your will and they obey properly.
Likely the response was "but I'm *your* asshole" and they both had a laugh.
People can be abrasive and get on each other's nerves. It can make you angry, but so long as there's no malice in what they've done (the malice part generally goes with crossing serious lines) it shouldn't be too hard to work out the cause of the friction.
And the ability to be an asshole can be a useful power.
no, no it's not normal to harbor very dark thoughts about your spouse.
I won't even bother reading trash like this if that's the message.
idiots
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