Haim
The Ambivalence of Control: A Story of Overwhelming Love
Haim, a man in his 40s in a relationship with Michal after a divorce, came to me because he felt he was overwhelmed by love in a way that was stifling his partner. Initially, I thought that this was truly what we needed to work on—his expectations of the relationship. But I quickly realized that the root of Haim's problem was similar to the issue I myself had to address: the need to please others.
Haim: "I am suffocating in this relationship," Haim began to tell me. "I am afraid of losing her. Something in our communication caused me to make a mistake and look at her phone. I saw that she had a connection with someone she wasn't telling me about. And I took it very hard. I don’t know if it's a romantic connection. There is a connection there, so why hide it and not come talk about it? Why not lay things on the table?"
Haim continued to describe how his partner distances him from her friends so they aren’t in the same groups. "I want to be secure enough in myself that no matter who she connects with, I know my worth and what I contribute. To feel that it's okay for there to be other people who fulfill other needs in her life," he continued.
Me: "It sounds like there is also a certain lack of trust there, which might be based on other experiences. Do you have examples of other things that happened in past relationships?"
Haim: "My ex-wife and I divorced, in part, because there was great distrust between us, and it scares me to go back to that."
Me: "Was that based on something real?"
Haim: "I never caught her, but I do have this fear that I give my all, and I want them to give back and to feel that just as you love, you are loved... Maybe I need to set boundaries for myself? To protect myself, so I don’t give everything I have and then get hurt. I lack confidence."
Me: "Let's talk about the security you are looking for."
Haim: "I was hurt at a very young age. At the age of ten, there was a girl who sexually harmed me. I was not even in a position to... It was repressed for years, and it came up a year and a half ago, and it sits in the background all the time.
And I don’t trust people... and that’s why my relationships are short. The longest one I had was the ten years of marriage, but it was very repressed back then... I couldn't let myself be touched in certain places. It was truly deeply repressed. And I think the place of security starts with that original trauma, if I look at my life. And with Michal, I am much more open, and she is the first person who can touch me however she wants, and she knows it.
I allow myself to be with her one hundred percent and let go of that place of not trusting people. On the other hand, the doubts constantly arise... do you understand? And it is important for me to be in a safe place. To put my head on someone and feel safe. It's not easy for me."
Me: "It’s very brave of you to choose to deal with these things. When there is an unprocessed experience, we look for different ways to process it. And being in a relationship without security is a way for the subconscious to process an experience where we felt insecure.
If you manage to process the experience on a subconscious level, you will no longer need to recreate situations of insecurity; either she will behave differently, or you will break up and find another relationship that has trust."
Me: "Let’s do an exercise: We'll take you back to early childhood before the age of ten. We won’t touch the trauma you went through right now, but your childhood experience before that. Is that okay with you?"
Haim: "Yes."
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At this point, I guided Haim into a visualization into the depth of the light in his heart. And I curiously asked Haim to show the light the source of the instability he was experiencing in life. I had an intuition that the source was deeper than the trauma he experienced at age ten.
Me: "What is the moment when you lost your stability? Be curious and allow things to arise. What comes up?"
Haim: "A lack of confidence comes up—that I am not good enough, successful enough, why didn’t I do things that needed to be done... and you always think differently from everyone else... And this came up around first or second grade."
Me: "Ask the heart to see the very first moment that it came up."
Haim: "I went with my father to a parent-teacher meeting, and they told him I wouldn’t succeed."
Me: "What did you feel at that moment?"
Haim: "Failure, disappointment."
Me: "Disappointment from what?"
Haim: "My father's disappointment in me, my disappointment in myself... and that has been with me all the time. I think that’s why even today it’s very important for me to succeed and show everyone that I am successful."
Me: "So it sounds like you also gained something positive from this—your ambition to act."
Haim: "Completely."
Me: "It seems you have a very strong gain from this experience. And we want to keep the gain without the loss. Take three deep breaths into your heart again, and through the light in your heart, ask to see little Haim at the parent-teacher meeting. And we will ‘freeze’ the moment in time, before all those thoughts that he is not good enough entered him. Imagine you approach that child and send him from your heart the quality of self-belief, of action, of creation, of everything he gained from that event. You give him in advance, from your heart directly to his heart, the traits he gained. And through the light, ask what he needs to smooth out this event—what qualities his subconscious needed to pass through it without internalizing the belief that he is not good enough."
Haim started to cry—crying mixed with a smile and love.
Haim: "I want to give him self-belief," he said, "to give him the feeling that he can and is capable of moving mountains." belief comes up that I can heal anything by myself."
Me: "So whisper 'spoilers' into his ear about all the good things that will be in his life. Hug him and tell him."
Haim: "That he will have a wonderful life, that no matter how difficult it is, he will succeed in the end. And that he should believe in himself all the way and remain himself and not try to please anyone."
Me: "You see how he fills with pride and excitement for the future. He anticipates the interesting life that awaits him. He already knows he will succeed and has nothing to fear. And you see how he breathes in the light you are sending him of self-confidence and self-belief."
Haim: "It's hard."
Me: Why?
Haim: "Because I haven't cried in years. And now I just feel all the tears coming out."
Me: "So there is a place for it now."
Haim continued to cry as a slow smile of relief rose on his face.
Haim: "And I want to remain myself and not please anyone else or try to change. I want to remain myself."
Haim's story was about the readiness to remain himself, without trying to please others. All his life he felt he had to prove something, and this gave him a lot—it gave him the power of action. But now, as an adult, he can decide to continue with that ambition without the feeling of not belonging and without disappointment. With the security that even when he is loved, he will still have the ambition to develop and move forward. This way, he can open up to a supportive and secure relationship, because he will no longer seek shaky relationships to reinforce the sources of his ambition.
