The answer I normally receive is “because my partner has behaved in ways which helped me to feel bad” for most people they don’t set out to help their partner to feel bad so exploring what’s behind the couples meanings and actions is critical.
This is why I help couples in my session learn how to understand each other, so they don’t inadvertently cause pain to each other without knowing.
When someone does something that helps us to feel bad and especially if that action caused us significant pain, we can struggle to let go of the bad feeling and we attach it to our partner, this is a resentment being born.
The result is each time I see you and hear you I now feel bad on some level about me.
So I expect this makes sense for most people.
Now lets look at how a resentment could be created. To resent someones actions a person would have to judge what their partner said or did and then put a meaning to it.
So the person judging the event is putting a meaning to a situation and then making their partner responsible for the meaning they created, this part of the process is important to understand.
If a person is the creator of their meanings and is using those meanings to break up a family this needs to be explored quickly.
From childhood we have not been taught to challenge meanings we put to the world we live in and so when the meaning we put to a situation is linked to extreme pain for that person that meaning is a fact. For example: I love you but I’m not in love with you.
I feel bad and it’s because you did, X,Y,Z.
The truth is the pain they feel is a fact. However the meaning the intelligent person has attached to the pain is not quite so clear.
You see the real meanings that cause the pain we feel happens much faster than we can process. So when we do feel emotional pain we have many choices of what to attach that pain to and so we go to the one that will protect us most and in pain it’s usually the most negative.
You make me feel bad so I have to protect myself from you. This can help them remove their love which is destructive to both people.
It’s important for individuals in relationships to become curious about the meanings they are putting to their partners actions and to discover if the meanings they are putting matches their partner underlying intent, if it doesn’t then the chances are they are wrong.
I see so many couples who are about to break up their families because of the meanings they have created, only for them to discover their meanings are not true.
This is a critical life lesson to learn because the direction of a persons life can change based on confusion rather than the truth and reality.
Harley Street Expert | Founder & High Performance Coach
With two decades of experience helping couples out of crisis, Stephen the founder of The Marriage Breakthrough Program, uses his proven system for rescuing and rebuilding relationships on the edge of divorce. A trusted advisor to CEOs, entrepreneurs, and industry leaders globally, his work blends emotional intelligence with strategic clarity. Known for navigating highly complex relationship challenges, Stephen helps individuals and couples find clarity and direction when everything is at stake.
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