What’s Behind Your Mask?

Growing up, my parents didn’t wear costumes for Halloween. It was the 60’s, and things were different then. My parents stayed home and gave out candy to the trick-or-treaters. My job was to dress up and collect as much candy as possible without getting robbed by the older kids, who made fun of the younger kids … and stole their candy. The day after Halloween, we would bring our candy to school and trade it for better candy. There were two unwritten rules: 1) never wear your costume to school, and 2) the older kids could demand full-sized candy bars from younger kids. Life was simple back then. 

As I grew up, my family eventually stopped participating in Halloween. However, I realized that I continued to wear an emotional costume throughout my life. I carried into my marriage a desire to please my wife by wearing different emotional masks. I was unaware of how much she wanted to know the “real” me.

As we went through the next couple of decades, along with the ups and downs of marriage, raising a family, and ministry involvement, I developed a straightforward definition of a successful marriage: if my wife wasn’t exploding, there was no problem. No smoke, no fire. My simple view came crashing down when a respected Christian leader said to my wife in my presence: “Jeff doesn’t love you,” and while I was expecting her to say: “Oh yes, he does,” she said: “I know … I don’t feel loved.” After I picked myself up off the floor, feeling completely exposed, I realized we needed help.

We eventually found our way to Relationship 180. As a nonprofit organization, R180 offered financial assistance for Christian leaders to get the help they may not be able to afford. Our therapist at R180 asked me a profound question: “Jeff, what do you do when people aren’t pleased?” I realized I had been putting on one emotional mask after another, never letting my wife or others see the “real” Jeff. Through the counseling work we did at R180 we both learned about our love styles and our core pattern. I learned I’m a “people pleaser” and over time learned how to break the destructive cycle that threatened our intimacy. Thank God for Relationship 180.

Now, after forty years of marriage, I am still learning to remove the masks that shield me from being known by my wife and others. And something surprising happened … I found that she loved the “real” me better than the fake and shallow version. Our relationship is now deeper, and I see more and more how I am being transformed into someone different every day.

Please know that at Relationship 180 we are here for you, your family, your children, your friends.