Extramarital affairs and cheating are often considered purely physical or emotional betrayals. However, from a spiritual perspective, these actions underline a deeper transgression; a betrayal of oneself.
A spiritual lesson in authenticity can be drawn from these actions. To be authentic means being true to oneself – adhering to core values, beliefs, and desires. When one cheats or engages in an extramarital affair, they defy their own essence. They compromise their own integrity causing inner turmoil, frequency imbalances, and spiritual disharmony. The road to recovery begins with improving the relationship with yourself: understanding your feelings, needs and desires, being more self-aware, learning how to communicate honestly with your partner, and finding healthier outlets to get your needs met.
Through hypnosis, a journey into childhood trauma often helps clarify core values, beliefs, and desires of the authentic self. We can often learn from our parents’ mistakes and cull out the wisdom of how to be better partners, and parents, as well as more emotionally stable and consistent human beings. Sometimes clients are subconsciously rebelling against the “normalcy” of their marriage which the trauma- self misinterprets as passionless or loveless. They must relearn what a healthy relationship looks and feels like and how to support this new way of existing.
From a broader perspective, cheating and extramarital affairs can be seen as an escape mechanism. Individuals may resort to these actions to avoid dealing with certain aspects of themselves, their life, or their relationship that they find unsettling. This can be linked to the spiritual principle of facing one’s shadow, the dark, unseen aspects of one’s personality. Avoidance and escape are not solutions, only temporary diversions. Emotional healing and spiritual growth happen when one confronts and addresses their shadow side or trauma self and overcomes intrapsychic conflicts, which restores inner harmony and emotional peace to relationships.
For one client, cheating represented a subconscious desire to end an unhealthy marriage, she couldn’t figure out how to leave without an abrupt ending. She hadn’t been happy for years but couldn’t muster up the courage or energy to file for divorce. She had invested a lot in him, was afraid of being alone and doubted any other man could love her. She didn’t trust her own instincts and the affair, at least initially, created the distraction she was craving. Ultimately, her higher-self knew this marriage was hurting her emotionally, but the shadow-self convinced her to hang in there and that things weren’t all that bad.
Neurolinguistic programming exercises can help clients uncover polarized aspects of themselves. By fully engaging the senses in experiencing both aspects of one’s persona – the shadow side and the Higher self, wisdom and insights are illuminated, and deep, rapid transformations can be made. One client said the images and feelings portrayed in these exercises remained vivid in her memory which over time deepened her compassion for herself, her partner, and set her on a better path.
Spiritually, these duplicitous behaviors reflect a lack of gratitude and appreciation. By disregarding the bond of a relationship and acting on fleeting desires, individuals fail to recognize and appreciate the existing blessings in their life, placing every aspect of their life at risk. Part of the healing journey ahead includes incorporating the spiritual principle of gratitude into one’s lifestyle by acknowledging what is cherished or valued verbally or through meditation. These practices can help repair spiritual imbalances.
And the final spiritual principles I want to highlight regarding cheating and extramarital affairs are love and empathy. Love in a spiritual context is all-encompassing. It involves empathy, understanding, and respect for others’ feelings, as well as a willingness to live in an honest and transparent fashion. It is protecting each other’s hearts and keeping each other emotionally safe from harm. By hurting others through such actions, individuals deviate from these core spiritual principles, causing spiritual discord and disunity in this sacred union.
Extracting spiritual lessons from such actions is not about justifying or judging. Instead, it helps in understanding the deeper issues that led to such actions and provides a roadmap for spiritual healing and growth moving forward. Through authenticity, confronting one’s shadow, practicing gratitude, and embodying love and empathy for oneself and one’s partner, spiritual harmony can be restored, and unhealthy relationship patterns diffused. Whether or not the marriage can be saved, everyone who has been impacted by this affair will benefit from the healing and recovery work you invest in yourself.
There are many tools used in hypnosis that can help clients recognize and experience the polarized and conflicting aspects of oneself; understand the thoughts, feelings, beliefs & behaviors that led them down an unenlightened path; identify the ways in which they have abandoned themselves throughout their lives and see themselves through a spiritual lens. Through an intensive self-healing program, one client noted this, “I can barely connect with the person in me who cheated” and another shared “it feels so good to align with the highest version of myself; I am finally at peace.”
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Are you new to hypnosis? Click here to learn more: Four Common Myths about Hypnosis: Breaking through the Barriers of Resistance – Sensorium Hypnosis & Mediumship, LLC
Click here for guidance on calming the trauma response: 5 Essential Techniques for Quieting the Trauma Response Pattern – Sensorium Hypnosis & Mediumship, LLC
Learn my brief candle meditation technique for deactivating the fight or flight response pattern: Video details – YouTube Studio
Master’s level Rehabilitation Counselor, certified Hypnotist, Energy Worker, Humorist, and Recovering Chaos Addict.
I value intuition over formal protocol and textbook explanations; clients over clinicians in identifying the most effective formula for recovery; joy over suffering – as most of the pressure we place on ourselves is simply unnecessary, misguided, and masochistic.
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