S2 EP327 – Relationships – Do You Believe You Can Make Others Change?

Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Inner Bonding Podcast. I’m Dr. Margaret Paul and today’s episode is about letting go of believing that you can change someone. Be sure to stay to the end because I’ll be sharing how you can greatly improve your life and your relationships.

Today we’re going to explore this question that sits at the heart of so many relationship struggles: Do you believe you can make someone else change? Most people don’t consciously say, “Yes, I believe I can control another person.”

Yet, in the many decades that I’ve been working with relationships, this is exactly what’s usually occurring that is the primary cause of relationship problems.

Do you explain over and over, get defensive, get angry, argue your point, judge, criticize, shame and blame, threaten, shut down and withdraw? Do you give yourself up, complying to pacify someone, over giving and caretaking them? 

All with the hope – sometimes conscious but often not – that the other person will finally change in the ways you want them to.

So, why do we try to change others? You’re not a bad person if you try to control other to get them to change. You likely do this because you want to feel safe, loved, seen, valued, heard, important to the other person, and connected with them.

If your partner is distant, you may try to get him or her to be more attentive, to listen to you, see you, and connect with you. If they are critical, you might try to get them to hear you, understand you, hoping if they do, they will see the error of their ways and be kinder to you.

If they are irresponsible, do you try to get them to grow up and step up with your anger or criticism?

Underneath all of this is likely a false belief: “If only you would change, then I would feel okay. My well-being depends on you being different.” This belief is often at the heart of the intention to control, because if you believe your sense of safety, worth, or lovability depends on someone else changing, then of course you will try to get them to change.

Is trying to control working for you? The chances are that instead of the other person changing in the ways you want him or her to change, it’s backfiring on you and may be causing the very problems you are trying resolve.

People change when they want to, not because someone is trying to get them to change. In fact, since most people dislike it when someone is trying to control them, even if it’s covert control like caretaking and complying, they might go into resistance and withdraw, shutting down to you.

So it’s very important to accept that you cannot make another person change. You might influence them, but you can’t control them. You might pressure them in various ways, and you might even get short-term results. But lasting change does not come from external pressure – it comes from their internal willingness. Even if they comply on the surface, resentment often builds underneath.

Trying to change someone damages the relationship. It creates power struggles, emotional distance, disconnection, lack of trust, and resentment.

When your intention is to control, your focus is outward on how to get the other person to change. When your intention is to learn about loving yourself, your focus turns inward, asking yourself questions such as, “What am I feeling?” “What am I telling myself?” “What do I need?” “What is loving to me?”

This shift in your intention changes everything, because the reality is that the only person you can change is yourself. And the paradox is that when you change yourself, shifting from controlling the other person to loving yourself, the entire relationship system changes, generally for the better. But if it gets worse due to you learning to love yourself, then this is important information that your partner or others are not supporting you taking loving care of yourself. At that point, you either need to accept that the relationship is likely as good as it’s going to get or leave it.

When you stop blaming, criticizing, withdrawing, or over-giving, and instead take responsibility for your own feelings, speak your truth with kindness, set clear boundaries, and stay connected to yourself and your higher guidance, the system cannot remain the same.

Real change doesn’t come about through a relationship system involving the various forms of control and resistance. Real change comes about through awareness of your intention, and more and more consistently choosing the intent to learn.

For example, instead of saying to your partner, friend, or family member in a blaming voice “You never listen to me,” You would say something like, “I’m feeling unheard, and I want to understand what’s happening between us. There must be a good reason that you don’t want to listen to me.” If the other person is also open, much can be learned.

Instead of withdrawing in the face of criticism, you stay present, perhaps saying something like, “I know you don’t like it when I withdraw, but I don’t like being criticized. What are you hoping for by criticizing me?”

Instead of blaming, you get curious. Instead of controlling, you care about learning. This invites a completely different response.

But you don’t have any control over whether the other person opens or closes. You opening to learning doesn’t guarantee that the other person will open to learning with you.

And what if they don’t open? What if they don’t change? Sometimes, even when you change your end of the controlling system, the other person doesn’t. This is where you need to be honest with yourself. If someone is not interested in growing, is consistently closed and unwilling to take responsibility for their own feelings, and they are unkind or abusive, what would be loving to you?

Before we move on to the next point, this is why I created my 30-Day video course, Wildly, Deeply, Joyously in Love. If you’re looking to transform your relationship, this course is for you. You can learn more in the description below.

It’s always loving to you to leave a physically or emotionally abusive relationship, but what if the relationship is just distant and disconnected? What if you can’t resolve conflict or have fun together? What if there is no passion in the relationship?

When this is the case, you need to decide what would be most loving to you – to accept it the way it is and let go of trying to change them, or to leave the relationship.

If you decide to stay, then your work is to take loving care of yourself by disengaging when it feels bad and finding friends to connect with. There may be many good reasons for staying in a distant relationship, such as joint parenting, financial reasons, or caring enough about each other to be okay as roommates. It’s up to you to decide what’s most loving to yourself.

Are you afraid to let go of trying to control and instead learn to take loving care of yourself.? Letting go of trying to control others can feel very scary, and there are good reasons for this. Are you ready to know whether the people who say they love you, really don’t?

This is what I faced when we first created Inner Bonding, and I started to practice it. I realized I had been controlling through caretaking and compliance, and I was very scared to find out that I wasn’t loved for me, but for what I did for others. It was especially challenging for me to start loving myself when my focus had been on being there for others while ignoring myself. It was easy to fool myself into believing that sacrificing myself was loving, and it took a lot of courage to come into truth about this – that giving myself up and caretaking my family is a covert form of control and was very poor role modeling for my children.

This is the situation that my client Bret was facing. Bret is a very caring man, so it seemed loving to him to focus on his wife’s and sons’ feelings and needs while forgetting about his own. He was indulgent with his children’s demands and consistently gave into his wife Leslie’s moods and demands. He walked on eggshells to avoid her anger.

It’s when he had a heart attack that he realized that his wife was never actually there for him – that he was in a caretaker-taker relationship. That’s when he sought my help.

As we explored his side of their relationship system, he became aware that he was always trying to please her to avoid her rejection of him because he was rejecting himself by making her responsible for his feelings. He pulled on her for her love with his caretaking, and she pulled on him for attention with her anger and blame.

Bret became willing to lose Leslie, rather than continue to lose himself. As he stopped tiptoeing around to avoid her anger and instead opened to learning with her, things got worse between them. Leslie was not interested in opening to learning and taking responsibility for her own feelings. Bret finally made the decision he had been avoiding for years – to leave the relationship. He realized that the stress of her anger was affecting his health.

Bert realized that as long as he was trying to control Leslie and his kids, he was abandoning himself, and that his self-abandonment was causing him much pain. But he also saw that loving himself rather than abandoning himself led to even more conflict in his marriage, causing even more pain and stress.

As Bret shifted his focus from changing his wife to loving himself, he became much more aware of his own feelings and needs. As he developed his loving adult through his Inner Bonding process, he became strong enough to speak his truth and take loving action for his highest good. And even though it was hard to leave his marriage of 28 years, he began to feel more peaceful and grounded, as well as empowered and authentic. He was also able to change his diet and lifestyle to heal the problems with his heart.

A similar situation occurred with Teresa. Teresa had been divorced for a few years before meeting Jeff. Jeff was exciting and seemingly open to learning. Teresa had previously done work with me. She was practicing Inner Bonding and was aware that she wanted to be with a partner who was open and caring.

However when she consulted with me, she had broken up with Jeff after a few years, realizing that he was suffering from a personality disorder. He was so wonderful at the beginning, but people suffering from narcissistic personality disorder and/or borderline personality disorder often love-bomb at the beginning of a relationship, but they can’t keep it up. Jeff had become verbally abusive and occasionally physically abusive. The reason Teresa consulted with me again was to understand why she had believed she could change Jeff.

Teresa realized that she had bought into Jeff’s blame that his behavior was her fault, and she had been trying to change herself to have control over getting him to change. She hoped by changing herself he would be the way he was at the beginning of the relationship. She realized in our session that because she didn’t want to accept her helplessness over him, she convinced herself that if only she changed, he would change. Helplessness over another person is a hard feeling to feel, and it’s easier to believe that if we change ourselves, the other person will change. This is what kept me in my 30 year marriage for so long.

So right now, think about a relationship where you want the other person to change – a partner, a friend, a colleague, or a family member.

Notice what you want from them, and ask yourself, “What am I hoping to feel if they change?” Loved? Safe? Valued? Important? Now bring your attention inside. And now ask yourself, “How can I offer this to myself? Take a breath and imagine your loving adult stepping in and giving your inner child caring, kindness, presence, and attention. 

Now ask your higher guidance: “What is loving to me in this relationship?” Listen for the quiet voice of truth.

The bottom line is that you cannot make another person change, but you have total control over changing your intention from controlling to learning about loving yourself and others, which changes your behavior from controlling to loving. And you have control over deciding to become more aware and present, and when you do, your relationships will change in one way or another.

Today, you might want to start being very honest with yourself regarding what your intent is in any given moment. You might want to ask yourself throughout the day “Am I trying to control, or am I open to learning?” and “What would it look like to care about myself in this moment?”

The more you love yourself, the less you need to control others, and this is where true relationship healing begins – with both yourself and others.

If today’s episode resonated with you and you’re ready to heal your end of your relationships, I invite you to check out my 30-Day online video course, Wildly, Deeply, Joyously in Love. It’s designed for individuals and couples who want to create loving relationships. You’ll find the link in the description.

Thank you for joining me today and thank you for your willingness to do this deep and meaningful work. I’ll see you in the next episode.

I’m sending you my love and my blessings on your healing journey.