I was recently working with this 35-year-old guy who booked an appointment because he was feeling devastated after his wife admitted to him she had kissed another guy.

This occurred four months ago and he thought about it at least three times every day. He had a clear picture in his head of his wife passionately kissing this man. The movie was on auto-pilot and he constantly reminded her of how she had shattered his life.

This occurs with many relationships – one person goes outside the relationship to have a need met.

When asked if he had done anything that would make her seek a kiss outside the relationship, I was surprised with his honesty in admitting he had been treating her terribly.

Let’s examine this.

If you treat someone badly, there is a chance they will start looking outside the relationship to get their needs met.

Should she have kissed the guy?

No. She and her husband should have had a discussion about what she was experiencing.

Given it was only one kiss and she never did it again, plus she fessed up (as against him finding out) shows she is willing to take responsibility for what she did.

“Did she show remorse?” 

“Lots of it. She keeps saying she is sorry.”

When a person shows remorse, there’s a good chance they will not re-offend.

An err in judgement can be a great thing to point out this relationship is not working and needs help.

This guy commented he knew what he should be doing – forgiving his wife – but was unable to do it.

“How many times did she kiss this guy?” I asked.

How many times did she?

This guy said “Once”.

“No, she didn’t.”

“Yes, it was only once.”

“Not in your head. It happened four months ago and you think about it at least three times a day. That’s at least 360 times you have seen your wife kiss this guy. Every time you see it happen, you simply add more negative energy to the event. Seeing it happen once is bad enough. Seeing it happen 360 times makes this problem a huge one. You just keep stacking the problem.

If you want to make this relationship work, you need to play a better movie. A movie of what you do want.”

This is a great message.

All too often we continue to stack negative movies onto each other which makes the problem far bigger than it needs to be. 

Ensure you play good movies in your head because what you focus on is what you are going to get more of.

You’ve got this.