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8Instead of giving your partner a beautiful Mirror to look into, you accidentally causeyour man or woman to feel either suffocated or unloved, or both. In either case, it isonly a matter of time before your partner wants out, because you have splintered theMirror.That’s the bad news. The good news is that while there are thousands of relationshipmistakes, there are only three behaviours that are Thorns that tend to splinter theMirror. So, take heart. In most cases, restoring attraction, passion, and trust betweenyou is not very complicated. You do not have to change your entire personality orcharacter. You do not have to be perfect.But, while you certainly can make mistakes (and many of them), you cannot repeat aThorn behaviour and win.If you’ve heard of the 80/20 principle, then you will understand this immediately.The 80/20 principle states that 80% of your results come from 20% of your activities. Forexample, in a business, 80% of the sales revenue comes from 20% of the clients.(Actually it’s usually 95% of the money that comes from 5% of the clients).What the 80/20 principle is trying to teach us is the concept of leverage. Leverage isbasically when you find the one small thing that gets you huge results. For example, ifyou want to lose belly fat, the one small thing that will help you the most is to eat lessthan 15 grams of sugar per day. If you want to create wealth through investing money,the one small thing that will give you the biggest dividends is to grow your money usingcompound interest.That’s why if you want to stop a divorce, save a marriage, or get your ex back, yourtop priority must be to remove the Thorn. Removing the Thorn that caused yourrelationship to break down is your leverage.The Three ThornsIn the famous Lion’s Paw folktale, the lion has a thorn in his paw. Only the littlemouse has the courage to take it out, and they become lifelong friends.A Thorn is simply a behaviour you engage in repetitively. It’s a behaviour you areprobably only a tiny bit aware of. Yet, this behaviour has probably been eating away atwww.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

9your marriage or relationship from the inside from years by splintering the Mirror yourpartner needs to feel loved, safe, and passionately attracted to you.But, you cannot remove the Thorn if you don’t know what it is. And, if your spouse isleaving you, I guarantee that you do not understand the Thorn from your spouse’s pointof view and or how it has splintered the Mirror. You therefore do not understand why orhow things have deteriorated so much between you.Over time, despite the deep love between you, the Thorn started to overshadoweverything. Eventually, your partner burned out of the Thorn. She decided, “I cannothave this Thorn in my life. I never want to feel this way again.” The Thorn has destroyedthe Mirror, and your man or woman gave up that it can be restored.I see this in my work with clients every day. The spouse who wants the divorce hasdeveloped an almost phobic-like reaction to the Thorn. Just the thought of having toexperience the Thorn even one more time is intolerable to her, and she will do almostanything to avoid it.It’s important to understand that coming to this conclusion was devastating for yourspouse. Your ex loves you to the moon and stars, and was hoping you’d change. He triedto tell you about the Thorn, but for whatever reason, you weren’t ‘picking up what hewas putting down.’ Eventually, he decided that the only way to get rid of the Thorn wasto get rid of you.But, please understand that the Thorn is not YOU. It is simply a behaviour that youengage in. That’s it. And, it’s one that you can change, right now. You have the power tochange if you want to. You can change the patterns that destroy love.Most people will tell you that change is really hard. I think this is because they do notunderstand how to change. When you truly, deeply understand how to change, it’sactually remarkably easy.Of course, once you remove the Thorn, you finally create the trust that has beenmissing in your relationship for a very long time. You re-kindle the passion and joy thathas been eluding you both. You put the Mirror back together, and this is what yourspouse desperately needed and wanted.Here are the Three Thorns.www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

10Review them carefully.you may be causing your spouse or ex to experience morethan one Thorn!Thorn #1Being Dominant & Controlling (Especially About Love Languages)When you are dominant and controlling partner, you like you get your way. You arebasically the Alpha Dog in the relationship. It’s not that you are trying to demean yourpartner. You just want things the way you want them.You want to do the activities you want to do, including work.You want to spend your money the way you want to spend it.You want to raise your kids the way you want to raise them.You want to spend your leisure time the way you want to spend it.You want to go on the type of holidays you like.Are you reading my mail here?Here are just a few examples I’ve seen in my private practice:One couple had frequent tension over holidays. She loved hot beach vacations, buthe preferred camping. So, she went camping with him every year for 17 years. But whenshe asked him to stop at a mall on the way home from the last trip, he refused, sayinghe didn’t like to shop.A woman married a man who had a son from a previous marriage. She couldn’tshake the feeling that his stepson was higher priority than her. She repeatedly asked herhusband to tell his son to clean out his old bedroom. Despite many requests from her,this man kept refusing to talk to his son. One day, she gathered up all her stepson’sstuff, threw it out, and asked him for a divorce.One husband did not have a job because he had gotten a huge insurance settlementand did not need to work. His wife worked full time. Yet for 18 years, she did all of thechild care and household chores – including on weekends - while he went golfing.www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

11One wife had a credit card debt that was stressing her out because it had given her apoor credit rating. She told her husband repeatedly that she wanted them to pay it off.Instead, he told her he wanted to spend their money on buying a house in a new cityand move their family there.A woman with a very successful business bought an expensive piece of land to builda retirement home. Her partner did not want to make this investment - he felt it was toorisky. A few months after the purchase, the real estate market tanked. It took them overten years to pay it off.A woman wanted her husband to take her out to nice restaurants for their datenight. He did not care for dining out and felt it was squandering money. The most hewould agree to was bringing home a bag of popcorn for a movie night on the couch. Idon’t have to tell you how this went over with her.A man who loves mystery shows was in the middle of watching his favourite seriesfor the 8th time. When I asked his fiancé why she had never watched it with him, shesaid, “Because he really wants me to watch it.”One man insisted on controlling everything about the household finances. It got tothe point where, when she would ask him if she could get an expensive hair cut, hewould ‘joke’ that she could do it as long as she made love to him afterwards.One charming fellow treated his lady like a queen. However, when she revealed tohim that her boss was her ex-boyfriend, he became completely insecure. He demandedshe quit her job immediately. He did not stop harassing her until she finally broke upwith him (she did, however, keep working with her ex).Check out the following patterns of being dominant and controlling. It’s unlikely theywill all apply to you, but if even one of them does, you probably have a major Thorn onyour hands. You ask your partner to do leisure activities you want to do, yet rarely do thingsshe wants to do. When there is a choice of movies, restaurants, or games, your preferencesusually prevail.www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

12 You spend time on hobbies (e.g., playing hockey, shopping), and are unconcernedthat your partner must do more child care to accommodate you. You are self-absorbed in conversations. If you are not talking, or the conversationdoes not revolve around you, you tend to check out. You get your way in household issues, such as: how the house is decorated,whether you have pets, where you live, and the cleanliness level of the house. You expect your partner to spend time with your family, but do not return thefavour often. When there are differences over issues such as spending money and raisingchildren, you get your way most of the time. On vacation, you get your way on travel destinations, daily itineraries, andactivities. You do things that affect your partner – e.g., arrive late, mess up the house – andare basically unconcerned about how this affects him or her. When the important people in your life become upset about your dominance anddemand more equality, this provokes anxiety in you. You argue, becomedefensive, and explain your point of view. You struggle to listen about this side ofyourself.Why Thorn #1 Destroys LoveThe problem with being dominant is that if your needs are always coming first, thenby definition, your partner is not very important. And when your partner feelsunimportant, she doesn’t feel cared for. She doesn’t feel loved.Also, when you are dominant, what you are communicating is that your way is thebest way. This makes your woman or man feel stupid, because the only reason tocontinually insist on your way is because you think your way is better. Your partner willhave thoughts like, “My spouse will not listen to my ideas about what to do with ourmoney. He must think I’m a prize idiot.”www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

13It goes without saying that if your woman or man feels unimportant, unloved andstupid, the Mirror has officially been splintered. Remember, your woman fell in lovewith you because you made her feel like the most important, lovable, and amazingperson on earth. Now, when she interacts with you, she does not see the wonderful,amazing person she is. Instead, she sees her flaws. And not just any flaws, either. Shesees her biggest fears about herself come to life.Here’s an example. Let’s imagine your woman feels most loved is by making love,but sexual intimacy is not that important to you. You would rather express love bymaking a pile of money and giving it to her. Over time, your woman will come to believethat you do not desire her. She will start to believe that she is undesirable andunlovable. And, this is likely her worst fear about herself. So, while you didn’t evenrealize it was happening, you made your woman feel ugly, unattractive, and alone. Yourinsistence on being the Alpha dog about how you express love is the Thorn.Eventually your spouse’s resentment over being dominated will surface in thefollowing ways: Lessening of passion and affectionOverreactions to trivial situationsIrritability and crankiness towards youDepression and fatigue that do not seem to have a causeAddictions, particularly weight gain, smoking and drinkingEmotional infidelity or actual infidelity70% of all divorces are initiated by the female. Dominance by the husband is oftenthe reason. The wife concludes that the husband does not truly love her, because hedoes not care or notice that she is not getting her way. However, the dynamic can workthe other way around (with the wife dominating the husband) just as easily.The second problem is that when you dominate another person continually, you loserespect for him, and will eventually take him for granted. The equality needed formutual admiration simply disappears.The irony of Thorn #1, Being Dominant and Controlling, is that very few peoplerecognize their own dominance. Even the most dominant people I’ve met do not viewthemselves as dominant. When I’m working with a Dominant Spouse, and I tactfullywww.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

14point out his dominance, he will almost always say, “Well, what was I supposed to do? IHAD to. (fill in the blank here).At this point, I usually smile and point out that he didn’t HAVE to make that choice.He wanted to do things his way and he was not open to negotiating.Note on Love Languages“Love language” is a term coined by the book The Five Love Languages. A lovelanguage is the way a person receives love.1When you speak your partner’s love language, you make him or her feel really loved.For example, your partner might feel loved when you share his favourite activities withhim. Or, she might feel loved in your do things for her, like wash her car. Or maybe yourpartner feels loved when you make love. Or maybe your partner needs you to expressyour love verbally by telling her how much you love her.When you are dominant about your love language but you don’t speak yourpartner’s love language, the Thorn will become very acute. For example, let’s imagineyour husband feels loved when you spend quality time with him on his favouriteactivities, such as watching sports. On the flip side, you need him to listen to you aboutyour day. And, let’s imagine that you watch sports every night, but he only listens to youonce a month.If this situation continues, it’s a ticking time bomb waiting to explode, because youare just not feeling loved. He may do 100 things a day to try and make you feel loved,and he may genuinely love you, but if he isn’t speaking your love language, nothing hedoes will really hit the mark.So, if you have been dominant about your love language, yet not speaking your manor woman’s love language, you need to remove this Thorn, fast.Thorn #2CriticizingCriticizing your man or woman is so obviously damaging to a love that it almostdefies talking about. Yet, it is rampant and always splinters the Mirror.www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

15What Is Criticism?Criticizing someone is an aggressive way of communicating that says, “You’re not Okthe way you are. But, if you change and act the way I think you should, I will approve ofyou.”Here are some typical examples of being critical: You’re too hard on the brakes when you drive. We’re going to have to get themreplaced every 3 weeks. Why can’t you ever stick to a diet? You’re so selfish. I looked after the kids all weekend and you never lifted a fingeraround the house. Are we really going to see you in a dress? You never dress up. Why didn’t you come to the hospital without me having to ask? How could youtreat me with such disrespect? The way you make the bed causes my feet to hurt. Are you trying to cause mepain? I can’t believe you got upset about not getting room service—your parents musthave completely spoiled you. You’re eating M & M’s like they’re peanuts! I was reading an article the other dayand I think you should start making your own juice. It’s the best way to get sugarin a healthy way. Your office is not arranged very efficiently. You should get rid of the two filingcabinets and move a chair in that space. You need to start saying No to your mother. It’s making you resentful to lookafter her all the time.www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

16 You’re too permissive with our daughter. She’s going to grow up selfish andspoiled.One couple came to me on the brink of divorce because he was very critical of herweight. She was not fat. But, she had gained weight since their wedding, and he tookevery opportunity to mention it. One night, they had an epic fight because when sheasked him why he was drinking so much, he replied, “Because you’re so fat.”Why Thorn #2 Destroys LoveCriticism is a lack of acceptance towards another person. You are basically shamingyour partner and telling him how inadequate he is. It is a way of attacking the otherperson’s self-esteem.When you are critical of your partner, you take away the Mirror. Instead of showingyour spouse how awesome he is, you are showing him how terrible he is.Many people criticize because they are frustrated with their man or woman. Theybelieve criticism will motivate him to change.The problem with this approach is that it doesn’t work. You cannot shame anotherperson into changing. If you need your spouse to change, and you have a legitimatebeef, there are ways to motivate him. But shaming him will only cause him to moveaway from you in order to protect himself emotionally. And every time you criticize, youadd one more splinter into the Mirror.Thorn #3Being NeedyWhen you are needy and clingy, you are constantly looking for reassurance,affection, approval, and validation from your partner.You are a bit like a bottomless pit emotionally. No amount of approval or love fillsyou up. You are always hungry for more approval. You are addicted to the temporaryjolt of approval that comes from pleasing others. It’s as though you are saying with youractions, “Do you like me? Do you like me? How about now? Do you like me now?”Here are some ways of being needy:www.TheCouragetoWin.com Lisa Brown & Associates 2017

17Over-PursuingOver-pursuing is a serious relationship mistake that blocks another person’sconnection to you and prevents him or her from expressing the love, respect, andappreciation you want.I want you to start by drawing a circle on a piece of paper in front of you. Next, putthe person’s initials you would like more love or respect from inside the circle. Put yourinitials outside the circle.2When you are outside the circle, this person will connect to his love, respect, andappreciation for you. He’ll pursue you for time together, be compassionate towards you,and place his needs above yours when appropriate.When you are in the circle, you cannot get another person’s acceptance. In somecases, you will be barely able to get his attention.Staying outside the circle is a necessary for any romantic relationship to survive.Without it, getting your partner to care about how you feel and be loving towardsyou is as difficult as cl

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