As in the 70′s, swinging or having open marriages seems to be gaining some traction again. I talk with a growing number of young couples that have tried to incorporate other couples or sexual partners into their relationship or marriage. Many choose to not deal with some of the underlying and more fundamental problems in their marriage, and some just want to add variety to the mix.

Looking at this through its sociology and economic implications, open marriages and  consensual,extra-marital relationships seem to be a sign of the times. I think that the economic recession has made divorce difficult. Many couples who have been struggling financially find themselves fighting and in more conflict, and in a situation where breaking up or divorce is not a possibility. it’s too expensive to divorce, and it would be too difficult for one partner or the other to make it on their own. High unemployment, job insecurity, and economic instability have led married couples to come up with other creative solutions to their troubles, and their boredom.

Some couples are able to incorporate these extramarital relationships successfully into their own marriage, but such a couple is the rarity. It would take extremely good indication skills, as well as full disclosure and honesty, to be able to maintain a primary intimate relationship while carrying on an outside relationship, or bringing another partner into one’s marriage.

But, for the average couple, swinging or opening up their marriage to outside partnerships usually ends in some kind of misery. I talk with a lot of couples that have tried this arrangement for whatever reason, sometimes to alleviate the boredom, sometimes to add some variety, and sometimes to flat out not deal with the fundamental problems that they have in their marriage. Swinging and open relationships based on these types of things usually ends poorly. Emotions almost always get in the way, and one marital partner usually develops an emotional attachment to one of the extramarital partners. Although it may be sex that’s agreed upon initially, couples don’t always lay out all the ground rules that they need, and one often gets hurt in the mix. In some combination, it’s secrecy,  poor communication, deception, or a sexual imbalance that combined to create problems in the primary marriage, and what started as something exciting and thrilling for the partners ends with more marital hopelessness.

I can’t say across the board that swinging is not for everyone. Each couple is unique, and each marriage is different from the next. What I do know, is that because so many couples have such a difficult time developing good, solid communication skills, and building a foundation of trust in their marriage or relationship, swinging and open partnerships would most certainly undermine those long-term efforts.

If boredom or variety is what a couple is seeking, I think that those things can be alleviated in other ways. Good communication skills go a long way. Opening up a conversation about unmet sexual needs, unmet emotional needs, and ways to improve one’s marriage through variety can most definitely reignite and turn around your marriage or relationship, without needing to risk hurting one partner or the other and eroding the fundamental trust that you’ve already built within your relationship.

Long before cheating or infidelity happens to a marriage, the seeds have been planted. Cheating on a spouse often is the accumulation of negative experiences and discontent, both within one’s relationship or marriage, and within oneself.

Many unhappy partners mentally or emotionally start to check out of their intimate relationships before their cheating behavior starts. As many extramarital relationships start slowly or innocently enough, they are the culmination of a gradual erosion of emotional or sexual commitments to one’s partner. The love or passion starts to wane in a relationship or marriage, and sometimes no one sees it. It just happens over the course of time, and major needs start to go unmet for a partner.

For a lot of guys, be mental, sexual, or emotional withdrawal from their primary relationship is the first sign of problems. Many men that I talk with stopped feeling like they are winning in their relationship or marriage. They stopped feeling loved or validated by their wife or girlfriend, and at one point decided to stop trying. Maybe they feel inferior or not good enough for their wife or girlfriend, and, for a lot of men, no matter how much effort or attention they put into their wives or their marriages, they’re constantly plagued with that sense of “not being good enough.” As long as that “not good enough” experience resides in a partner, there are sure to be marital problems that arise.

Men who fall victim to cheating, or even thinking about cheating, may not be getting some of those needs met in their relationship. Conversely, their wives and girlfriends may be saying the same thing. It may be the wives and girlfriends who stopped receiving affection, caring, love, and support from their husbands and boyfriends, and so they, in turn, stopped giving back. This ‘freeze out’ effect–where both partners have cut off basic needs from the other –  leads to inevitable relationship decline and suffering without the right tools to diagnose and fix what’s ailing the relationship.

Here are some tips to help if you’re considering cheating on your partner:

1. Ask yourself if there are any needs that are going unmet in your relationship or marriage. If yes, how do you deal with not getting your needs met – whether they be sexual, emotional, physical, or the like?
2. Ask yourself: Do I have a habit of withdrawing emotionally from my relationship? Am I thinking of cheating as a way to cope with a difficult situation in my marriage?
3. And ask yourself: What are my reasons for cheating? What do I really need from another partner?
4. One more “ask yourself”: Am I doing it for the sex? What else reasons of my doing it for?
5. Consider your values: is immediate sex or affection from another woman more important to you now then are other things in your life? This is not a good/bad question of judgment, but rather asking you to weigh your values versus your potential behaviors. We tend to see the benefits of the impulsive or short-term decisions and act on them, instead of considering our values through the lens of longer-term decisions.
6. Consider getting individual therapy: you may not want to discuss this very personal issue with your wife or girlfriend. You may not be ready to yet. Talking with a professional counselor who can be a confidential, third-party source for you, maybe an option to help you work through some of the feelings and thoughts of cheating that are keeping you stuck.
7. Try not to put yourself in situations that will attract the potential for cheating. If you’re cruising dating sites, or being overly flirtatious with coworkers, you’re emanating sexual energy in a way that’s bringing that on yourself. If you have leaky sexual energy, get help for that before that leaky sexual energy turns into behaviors that you might regret.

Many guys I talk with don’t really know what they want sexually, and don’t know how to communicate sexually with their partner. Often times, a discomfort or fear about talking about sex prevents partners from really talking and connecting during sex. Unfortunately, communication problems around sex can lead to other forms of disconnection in the general relationship or marriage. Having a healthy sexual life includes being able to communicate your sexual desires and responses in a way that your partner can understand them, and attempts to meet those needs.

Knowing what you want sexually is the first start. Many guys say they just want more sex, which is fine, and don’t require as much attention to detail as their wives or girlfriends do. For women, on the other hand, sex is more about intimacy and connection, which necessarily includes communication. The guys that are able to communicate their sexual needs clearly what their partners are the partners who find themselves having richer and more meaningful sexual lives.

Being able to take a risk and indicate with your partner about what you want sexually from them is the second step. Often times, negative messages about sex tend to fill this space and prevent us from saying what we really want. It’s important to talk with our partners about what we want sexually, but just as important to talk about our fears and inhibitions. For men, a universal theme around sex is performance. Men want to know that they’re a high sexual performer, or that they’re able to please their partner in a way that makes them feel good and happy with them. In general, men want to know that they can please their wives and make them happy in their marriages and relationships. Sex is just an extension of that. Men want to know that they can please their wives sexually, as well as feel please themselves.

When it comes to performance anxiety (see last blog post on sexual problems and performance anxiety), guys set their performance standards too high, and sometimes fail them. Being able to talk with their partners about their fears about being a good sexual partner, and checking out what their partner what it is that they expect of them as their sexual partner, are important ways to break the ice and start communicating in a deeper way.

Here are more tips on how to more effectively to  communicate sexually with your partner:

• Know what feels good, and what doesn’t feel good, and take a risk and communicating with your partner.
• Talk about fantasies with your partner that you’ve been harboring in your mind; shall be happy that you did
• Create variety in your sex life, and in your relationship in general; sometimes, boring sex life is representative of hitting a boring patch in your relationship in general.
• Tune in and listen to what she wants more. Chances are good that she has some sexual desires that could use your attention, and listening more intently to what she’s interested in will deepen your sexual connection.
• Talk about your sexual pasts together, to the extent that you’re both comfortable with. Many times, guys really don’t want to hear this from their woman, but what I’m talking about is talking about the general issues. Talk about fears growing up about sex, messages that each got about sex, how sex was discussed in the family, and start to make the topic of sex a more approachable subject for both of you. You don’t necessarily need to go into the  fine details about each other’s previous sexual endeavors.

Creating a healthy sex life is a direct function of creating better and deeper to vacation with your partner. Consider some of these tips if you’re wanting to improve your overall sexual life.

Many problems that seem sexually based in a relationship or marriage are actually more interpersonally-based that would appear. Many times, conflict, fighting and distance between partners is often the basis for  sexual problems that develop between lovers. We’re going to talk about some of those “behind the scenes” issues that negatively affect your sexual performance or connection. Here we go:

1. Fighting and conflict: When you’re engaged in fighting with your wife or girlfriend (or partner), and bad blood is generated, it’s really hard to feel connected to them on any level, including sexually. It may be easier for men to want to engage in sex, but for women, sex is much more than the physical act. Women need to know that their guy loves them, cares for them, and is emotionally attuned to them. Fighting and conflict dampen the sexual connection, and can leave a couple listless and uninspired for sex. Work on working out the issues you need to be for sex, so that the connection is felt on a deeper level.

2. Performance anxiety: For a lot of guys, this is fairly common, especially in new relationships and for younger guys. Guys set certain standards for themselves as sexual partners, and when they do that, they almost guarantee themselves for failure. We may want to be the most sexually adventurous person on Earth, or the best lover that she’s ever had, but by setting such high standards for ourselves, we end up disappointing ourselves ( and possibly her). Try to relax, practice breathing exercises, and try to stay focused on the present moment enjoyment of the act itself. If you focus on your performance, you’re actually not very present. The best sexual performance is being present in the moment, and your partner will appreciate that a lot more.

3. Lack of communication, inside and outside of the bedroom: Sex is all about communication, and if there is problematic communication or none at all, especially around sex, your sexual connection may wane. Communication is vitally important to the health of the overall relationship, but when it comes to sex, it’s critical. Learning to start communicating what you need sexually, and what you like, is important in developing the sexual connection with your partner. Without it, sex becomes perfunctory, uninspiring and, well, just plain boring. Knowing what you want, and like, knowing how do  communicate that to your partner in a way that they understand will help ensure for a more satisfying (and varied) sexual life. Risk opening up and sharing some personal thoughts or sexual fantasies that you got, and in that risk  just may pay dividends.

4. Sexual confidence: For a lot of guys, competence is a huge issue in general, not just sexually. Women want men to be overall confident, and sexual confidence is just an extension of that. Women specifically want men to step up the assertive factor sexually. Some women that I talk to in counseling say that they wish their husbands and boyfriends would be more sexually assertive with them, and learn to make more of the first moves towards them. They say that they get tired of waiting or feeling like they have to initiate sex first, and want to know that their guy buys in a little more. Again, sex is an extension of other things, and taking the sexual initiative is not unlike taking the initiative with cooking, cleaning, supporting your wife or girlfriend, or taking the initiative to take care of yourself. They all communicate to her that she’s wanted, loved, and still attractive to you. She needs your validation, love and affirmation, sexually and otherwise.

5. Energy problems: Plenty of things can chip away at our energy levels: kids, workloads, stress, alcohol, depression, marital problems, and just general fatigue. Learning how to keep your energy high is laying the foundation for sexual success. understanding your unique energy patterns throughout the day and making lifestyle changes will help keep your energy flying high consistently. Choosing the right foods, adding good sleep, staying away from alcohol and tobacco, practicing daily stress management and relaxation techniques, having a social support system of friends and family, and learning how to communicate when you’re stressed are all really important things that you can do to generate more energy that will positively affect you in mind and body.

These tips are designed to help tackle some of the possible sexual problems in your relationship or marriage. If you suspect that there are physical or medical problems that need attention, please consult your primary care doctor. Many sexual problems are medically based, and these tips won’t work for you if you’re having those types of problems. Learning how to develop a sexual relationship with your partner is a relationship over time. You’re learning what works, and what doesn’t, to stay at your most optimal and to develop a sexual connection with the woman you love.

For a lot of men, living a life suppressing their true sexuality is living a lie. Some guys find themselves questioning their sexual orientation years into an otherwise successful marriage. When they are finally ready to trust their gut, and admit their own personal truth, the consequences can seem devastating.

When struggling men finally start to own their truth about their homosexuality, they are confronted with a myriad of issues. Perhaps the most prominent struggle lies in the actual coming out as a gay man. The process is confusing, and challenges men’s resilience to a host of potential dissenters: dealing with society and culture, dealing with themselves, getting the support of friends and family, and, most importantly, navigating the relationships that will now be altered as a result.

Gay men who have been living as a married straight man have to confront the end of their marriage, as well as the fallout of coming out to their wives or girlfriends. At times, it’s the wives and girlfriends who may have suspected it from the beginning; it’s the men who may not have woken up to it until much later, until they started trusting their gut. For guys with kids, it becomes a real struggle to assure their children that they are the same good father and provider but they’ve always been, and yet things will be different. It’s really hard to have to both deal with our own changing sense of identity, as well as to be present to the children’s confusion and feelings having to do with not just their father’s coming-out process, but of the end of their parents marriage. This is a multi-faceted issue that requires precision, care, compassion and time.

Redefining themselves as a gay man, and having to reconcile their previous lives as straight married man, takes a lot of work takes a lot of work and encourage. Family and friends may have a very difficult time understanding this at first, and the initial effects of coming out, ending a marriage, and redefining relationships may all seem difficult and overwhelming. But for these men who are trying to live their truth, it’s a process of self-actualization that takes time, compassion towards self and others, and an ability to see clearly into themselves.

If we look closely enough, we find that a lot of our behavior we can trace back to messages that we received growing up from our families of origin, or, more specifically, from our parents. As small children, our parents are our original models, and we learn about how the world works from them.

A lot of those messages we need to incorporate into our worldview for survival. Unfortunately, many of those messages are outdated, and continue to run like tapes in our brain. Those outdated tapes may continue to play on loop, and our behaviors, emotions, and thoughts are a product of those repeating messages. The relationships that we get into as adults are, in some part, formed from those outdated tapes. We learn plenty of good things from our parents about relationships; we also learn plenty of things that just don’t help us.

Challenging your family of origin messages, or those negative tapes, is the first step towards awareness and waking up to the fact that those tapes or messages can be changed.

Specifically, a lot of our ways of thinking about critical issues come from our parents: money, sex, intimacy, gender roles, professional images, how we fight in relationships, and all types of negative behaviors. We incorporate those messages into our experiences, and have varying degrees of awareness about them.

For men, a lot of the messages about stuffing your emotions, the message that “real men don’t cry”, and about learning how to withdraw, come from having learned those behaviors from a parent growing up, often times from a guys dad. When we get conscious of those  messages, we try to fight them, and sometimes succeed, and sometimes don’t. We often live in overcompensation mode, where we’ll “work harder, be better, be kinder, make more money,” and everything against what a parent did originally.

We have to challenge your family of origin messages to be able to grow up on our own. As long as we carry within us negative family of origin messages that are outdated, we stay stuck in the past and don’t consider alternative ways of being, and lose out on the chance to grow through those messages.

If we’re wanting to develop more confidence and better self-esteem, we have to deal with those early messages that communicated to us that we’re not good enough. If we want to develop healthier lifestyle choices, it may be that we have to face some ways of being that we’ve taken for granted, and have learned from our parents over the years. If we want to learn how to be a better money manager, it may benefit us to take a look at the internalized family tapes that play around money and the problems that result.

Challenging your family of origin messages is difficult. Many times, men stay complacent and don’t really challenge the status quo, where those tapes lie. If we can learn to become aware of some of those negative messages that play, we weaken certain challenge them and incorporate new messages that really will work for us. Change is difficult, and sometimes submitting to those early messages is just more convenient. The promise of being set free through shedding those messages is a promise you can’t afford not to make.

Unhappiness usually begins with ourselves. Other people may trigger us to feel negative or down, but were largely responsible for our own selves. How we communicate with ourselves is often an indicator of personal happiness. Self talk, or the inner dialogue that we have with ourselves, is something that people are not always aware of as it’s happening. We’re usually pretty reactive to people and situations, and tend to forget what’s happening behind the scenes, or how we’re talking to ourselves. The reality is that so often, we are wrapped up in negative self talk and verbal abuse towards ourselves. Being caught up in this kind of self talk makes it really difficult to connect with ourselves in a healthy way, and, consequently, to relate to others in a kinder, friendlier fashion.

Upon his first experience of Western self-criticism, the Dalai Lama was puzzled. In Tibet, where he’s from, there was no concept of a self critic. When I read this, I was impressed. As Americans, we’re so embroiled in negative self talk and beating up on ourselves, it never occurred to me that other cultures might find this a curiosity.

When we get into negative self talk, it’s usually centered around the idea that “I’m just not good enough.” we may have grown up with these messages, from our families of origin, and have been reinforced through other institutions, like school, church, and sports. We internalized these messages so many times, and after enough repetition, began to believe. So, as adults, we identify strongly with that negative inner critic. The problem is, we’re much more than that.

When you find yourself speaking harshly to yourself, beating up on or generally feeling negative towards yourself, remember that there are ways to deal with this. Here’s some important ideas to remember:

• The inner self critic is not truly who you are
• It developed over continual messaging and reinforcement while growing up
• We often strive to quiet the voice, usually with working harder to overcompensate
• This negative self critic is often a symptom of how we feel inferior, or just not good enough, to ourselves or others.
• There is most often times pain, fear or sadness underlying the experience of the negative self critic. Sometimes, it’s important to get in touch with the felt sense in our bodies, rather than continuing to intellectually feed the negative self critic with more negative thoughts.
• Practicing kindness with your self is the best gift that you can get yourself. It will spill out onto how you treat others. rehearse validating yourself for doing good work, setting aside time to take care of yourself or have downtime, and generally start to improve the relationship with yourself first.
• Remember that if you’re feeling critical overly critical or judgmental of others, you may be doing that to yourself first.
• Building positive self-esteem and better confidence comes from learning to change the inner verbal dialogue with ourselves.

Dealing with our inner self critic is tricky. It’s easier sometimes to just say what’s wrong with other people, or put our problems on the world, but looking inward and seeing the inner mental chaos that often drives us, we see a different picture. Changing the nature of how we relate to and treat ourselves is the first step towards more happiness and personal freedom.

With the proliferation of smartphones and social media, cheating and infidelity have found their new 21st Century outlets. Many couples embroiled in the difficult and devastating effects of marital infidelity, or cheating, have found their spouse to be texting another man or woman, or to have rekindling or developing a relationship on a social media site like Facebook.

Cheating online is such a loaded issue. Often times, suspecting spouses or partners have to act on “their gut” when they attempt to uncover their partner’s extramarital or extrarelationship behaviors. A lot of times, that instinctive feeling is confirmed when the partner finds incriminating (and often highly sexually suggestive) evidence on their phones, or in their social media accounts. A lot of times a partner has password access to the other’s e-mail box, and going against what they know better to do, they start the investigative process to procure that evidence against their cheating spouse.

As far as online “flirting” while engaged in another relationship, it’s really a slippery slope. Flirting is still transmitting sexual energy, in an indirect way, to someone else other than the one you love. It says something about one’s “leaky” sexual energy that’s not being channeled into the primary relationship, which is indicative of possible intimacy problems. I know a lot of people say that “well, I’m just a flirtatious person.” Again, it’s hard to say, but this is a socially acceptable way of saying that we are giving people are sexual energy through our communication or behaviors. Men think abotu sex all day, and fantasize about having sex with lots of women. It doesn’t mean we, as men, need to incorporate those fantasies into behaviors that undermine our self-control and our original relationships.

But does it mean that social media and texting promotes more cheating and infidelity? My opinion is no. My thinking is that if a partner is wanting badly enough to act on extramarital feelings, they’ll do it. Facebook and text messaging merely provide the convenient vehicles, unfortunately. People will find a way to cheat if they’re so inclined.

Unfortunately, these digital vehicles provide cheaters with way better technology than they were used to before. We’re reunited with long-lost boyfriends and girlfriends from our youth, ranging from high school crushes to college sweethearts to past office romances. Even if we “don’t mean to” start something romantic up with someone, if our desire is there to do it, we might do it. If we happen to be trolling the same sites over and over again when we’re surfing (Facebook, craigslist, Twitter), chances are that were going to continue to put ourselves in the same uncompromising position over and over again. I hear from a lot of partners that their behavior is “innocent,” and that its curiosity to them why their partner is fearful or doesn’t trust them. The threshold erodes and gets lower with each encounter, and soon, the cheating behaviors may be the next logical step for some.

Choosing to communicate in these ways surely has negative effects. If we find ourselves hiding communication from our partner, and not wanting to disclose that digital relationship with the one that’s closest to us, we may have a problem. By using social media sites for more than just entertainment, because were lonely, angry at our spouse, or not feeling affirmed or wanted by our partner, we end up transmitting and bleeding out sexual energy over the Internet. We may not “mean to do this,” but if we are unfulfilled emotionally or sexually, that energy is necessarily going to come out in way that we interact, whether that’s over the Internet or live in person with someone.

Here’s some tips to help you if you’re not sure if you’re starting to cheat online:

1. Ask yourself, ” Would my partner approve of this? What would I do if I were in his/her shoes?”
2. Ask yourself, ” What am I really wanting from this person online? Do I want have sex with them? Do I want them to validate me or affirm me, to feel good? Do I want something from them that my partner can’t give to me now?
3. Be aware of what you type, in terms of the type of energy that you’re emitting. Is it sexual or flirtatious in nature? Is it invitational or suggestive to the other person? What is the overall tone of your messages online?
4. Start to become aware of the cover-up behaviors, like denying that you’re communicating with someone online when your partner asks what’s happening online with you.
5. Talk with your partner or spouse about what happens online. Do you both know each other’s Facebook friends? Start to open up dialogue with your loved one about your online activity, and if you have nothing to fear, this communication will enhance your relationship. If you have something to fear or coverup, then refer back to tip number one.
6. Start to identify the unmet needs for you in your relationship or marriage. A lot of the time, cheating starts without the intention to cheat, and begins quite “innocently.” If you can start to identify those things that you’re not getting in your relationship, and be able to communicate them to your partner, you’re going to go a long way towards identifying the problem before it becomes a disaster. Often times, cheating starts from this point.

Cheating and infidelity have been here long before the advent of the Internet, social media, smart phones and text messaging. In the future, with even newer technology, cheating and infidelity will find a home there, too. It comes down to us, as the individuals in relationships, to help ourselves, and to start to identify if we’re starting the slippery slope towards cheating and infidelity in our own relationship.

One of the worst things that men can do with their anger is to stuff it inside themselves. Anger accumulates over time, and can and be expressed quite explosively without other outlets. Stuffing your anger helps no one, even if it’s a temporary fix to deal with a difficult situation in the present.

What men traditionally do are two things: one, they stuff their anger, withdraw from conflict, and usually say nothing. On the flipside, some men get explosive or rageful. The latter can mean several things. For these men who feel out of control and hopeless without an outlet, they break things, hit walls, and generally have no feeling that there is an outlet for their anger. With either of these two ways of dealing with anger, both are quite ineffective at communicating efficiently and directly with others, who are often the source of what we need and want.

Anger is often a function of needs not being met, and is a layer of emotional experience that masks other, deeper emotions like fear, hurt, sadness, loss. Those primary emotions are very difficult for men to express, because many men don’t or can’t risk the thought of emotional expression to those that are closest to them, such as their wives and girlfriends.

Our culture creates messages that make it very difficult for men to emote. We live in a culture of  traditional masculinity which states that to “be a man,” a “real” man doesn’t cry or show emotional vulnerability. Anger is a much more socially acceptable experience to have, because having the rest of the deeper, primary emotions is not socially acceptable in our culture.

How can you deal effectively with your anger instead of stuffing or exploding? Here are some tips in how to communicate anger more effectively:

• Ask yourself this question: ” What am I really needing right now in this moment? What do I need or want from the person or situation that has upset me?”
• Identify the trigger person/ statement/ event that has ignited your anger. many times, men get angry, but they can’t connect their anger to what actually caused it. Identifying the causal relationship to your experience of anger sounds like common sense, but for many men, it’s not, especially when their anger takes over and it blinds rational thinking.
• Get in touch with the experience of anger. What’s most destructive is when we see our anger with negative thoughts. Anger feeds off of negative thinking, and when were angry we tend to lose awareness of all of the negative thoughts that are contributing to our experience of anger. Breaking that cycle is quick and often easy, except that it requires paying attention to our “felt sense” of anger, whether that’s in your chest or heart region, in your shoulders, in the pit of your stomach. Sitting with that physical experience for as long as you can, often times you’ll find that the anger shifts into deeper emotions, or gradually dissipates on its own.
• Try to communicate verbally that ” I’m angry”, and take a risk to say it to the person that you’re upset with, like your wife or girlfriend. If you own your anger, and don’t criticize, judge, or threaten the other person, they are much more likely to hear you and continue talking through the problem.
• Take care of yourself. don’t internalize the anger, or flip it back on yourself. Many guys want to go into wall, or do something irrational. The pressure and seen that builds up from anger is great, and the need to release it is just as great. Taking a step out of the situation, taking a short drive your car, going to the gym – these are all very effective, short-term strategies to help you cope immediately with your anger. But, they are not long-term solutions.
• If you need to withdraw, lead yourself withdraw. State to the person, “hey, I think I need a quick break. I’m really angry, and I need some cooling off time.” respect your need to withdraw from the person or situation. This is a very good coping strategy for demand for the short-term, but again, it’s not a long-term strategy.
• Continue to work your stress management routine every week, whether that’s rigorous exercise, hitting the gym, meditating, having time for yourself, or doing whatever you need to do to help yourself relax. Stay away from sugar, caffeine, nicotine, and other stimulants or depressants that will affect your experience of your ability or anger.

Anger is a really difficult emotional experience to deal with. Most men have a very hard time dealing with and communicating their anger in a way that works for both them and the person that they’re trying to communicate with. the fact that you’ve committed to dealing with your anger in a healthy way shows that you want to control and change that which is not working for you. Keep at it, because this is a long-term strategy, and know that as you continue to work on it, it’ll get easier.

One of the worst experiences men tell me they have is one of feeling detached from the world, or numb. In this state, it’s kind of like not really “being there”, but feeling detached from others, your own body and from your life in general.

Being able to recognize this numbness is a huge step. A lot of guys simply drift through their days, without even being able to label what they’re experiencing.

Sometimes, we, as men, shut ourselves down to cope or deal with situations that may be too difficult, too scary, or simply too “unattainable.” We psych ourselves out, tell ourselves a certain narrative about how we think the situation is (when it may be completely different), and then believe that new narrative. For example, we may tell ourselves that “work sucks – that’s just the way it is.” And we may then alter our behaviors and our general experience around that narrative. We may comply with that narrative, and that becomes our experience. And, as an unfortunate result, we may go numb in the process.

Men who go numb try to cope with adverse situations. We shut down, as men do. We try to make “the best of a shitty situation.” We tell ourselves “it is what it is,” and submit to the problem instead of working on it. We bunker down, and go within ourselves, and just learn to integrate the adversity into our lives. It’s like walking around with a broken arm, saying to yourself, “Oh, it’s not really that bad. I’ve still got another one.” Through rationalization and denial, we make a bad situation a little less bad, but certainly suffer the consequences if we go numb.

Numbness implies that your vital life energy has been blocked or frozen. Generally, unless we can get the energy and vitality flowing again, we continue to bask in the numb state.

• Difficulty communicating or “connecting” to emotions (also known as ‘normative male alexythymia’)
• Hard time expressing angry feelings
• “Fuzzy” quality to things, experiences, people, food, etc.
• Low energy, or constant fatigue
• Don’t feel like you’re ‘in’ your life
• Poor sleep
• Feel irritable with others
• Don’t want to associate with others
• Generally don’t enjoy the activities you once did
• Not feeling like you’re ‘in’ your own body; not aware of body movements, etc.

Many of the symptoms described above also describe depression. For men, it’s difficult to know or admit that we’re depressed, and we could experience a state of depression as a constant numbing experience. In fact, we may be depressed, and just not know it, or admit it to ourselves. Male-type depression is a little different from the depression that women experience. Studies show that almost two-thirds of men who were actively suffering from depression didn’t get the help they needed.

When we’re numb, we miss out on living. We miss out on our lives, and the people in it, which breeds guilt and unresolved feelings within us.

What to do when you’re numb:

• Admit to yourself that you’re detached, numb, etc. Start talking about it with someone you trust.
• Seek help. A good counselor can help you hone in on what the numbness is pointing to, and set you up on a treatment plan to address the issues that underlie the numbing and detached feelings.
• Try yoga. Yoga gives perks all the way around, including getting you in your body and freeing up some of the blocks that promote the numb state
• Practice breathing exercises: one of the best, and time-efficient, ways to get back into your body is through conscious breathing. Try this at your desk. For five minutes, close your eyes and focus on your breathing. This serves to reembody us when we’ve strayed from ourselves.
• Stay off the alcohol, caffeine, and drugs. It’s tempting to want to use these substances to deal, but they only make things worse They interrupt precious sleep, leave you more depressed, and alter your experience of being in your body to begin with.
• Engage in rigorous exercise: mountain bike, hike, jog and generally do things to “re-embody” yourself. These activities are also cheap antidepressants, and can help you feel less numb and detached.
• Make a list of the things that are unsatisfying for you: start to ask yourself, “What do I put off and not deal with, that needs my attention?” It may be that your numbness is related to one of these issues, and starting to address the underlying issues.
• See if you’re struggling with anger. Make a list of the things you’re angry about, and see if there are any unattended issues there. Sometimes, numbness is inverted anger, and men are notoriously poor at expressing their anger effectively.

These are some tips to get you feeling less numb and detached. Have you experienced numbness and detachment in your life? What do you do to cope? Hopefully, some of these tips you can integrate soon, and get your feeling more present in your life.