Posts Tagged: relationship

Take Back Your Power

Have you ever been in a relationship with a partner or boss or acquaintance where the conversation gets ugly? Maybe you are shocked by what was said and frozen to silence. Or maybe you were angered and snapped back something equaling mean-spirited. Whatever the scenario, you’ve probably wished later that you were able to respond more wisely.

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Often, when a conversation or disagreement starts to go south, one or both parties begin acting childishly. They use sarcasm, threats, name-calling and blame shifting to prove their point or win. These are emotionally immature ways of communicating, with emotionally charged feelings that result in immature understanding and poor problem solving. No Bueno.

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It doesn’t have to be that way. Although you can’t control what the other person does or says, you can control how you respond. Often reactions to negative stimulus (like mean words, gestures or attitudes) are automatic and unconscious. We barely even recognize what we are doing or saying until it’s over. Today, I’ll give you some tips on how to recognize your part in the unhealthy dynamic and ways to improve.

For a little exercise, choose a recent argument or dilemma in which you reacted problematically. If you can become more aware of your own thoughts, feelings, and actions, even the unconscious ones, you’re much more likely to gain control of them. Here are some questions to ask yourself so you can be less reactive to painful stimulus:

  • Why was I so angry/scared/withdrawn?
  • What exactly was I feeling when it happened?
  • Does that feeling remind me of a familiar feeling from my past?
  • Did I react similarly this time as I used to react to past painful stimulus?
  • Knowing what I know now, what would have been an appropriate response?
  • What kind of response would have solved the problem instead of added to it?

Once you are able to answer these questions with certainty, you will be twice as likely to respond with wisdom the next time you are faced with a painful or scary stimulus. We can not control or be responsible for other people’s choices or behaviors, but we can determine how we will respond to them. This is especially true in long standing close relationships because behavior patterns can be observed and even predicted. We know that another challenge will arise and another disagreement will emerge. Think about how you might want to respond next time with the following tips:

  • Recognize your triggers.
  • Slow down your response enough to think it through.
  • Imagine yourself responding the way you want to.
  • Recognize your personal needs for respect.
  • Determine your boundaries ahead of time.
  • Assert those boundaries with love and respect.

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This list might take us our lifetime to master, but the energy trying is always worth it. Being a student of our own feelings and behavior adds value to out circle of influence. The more we are able to harness the power of our response, the stronger we become, the straighter we hold our heads, and the better we are treated in return. We can not expect others to value us more than we value ourselves. Taking hold of ourselves, while connecting with others in emotionally adult ways is the call for all of us.

He is Awful to Me, But I Still Stay: What to do if This is You

Do you recognize that your guy is not being good to you, but you just don’t feel you can leave?  Many women feel this way. They feel trapped between two bad options, 1)leave him and possibly make things worse, or 2) Stay and live in misery. Is this you? Maybe you’ve tried marriage counseling and waited patiently for things to change. Maybe you recognized that you were part of the problem (which is always the case) so you worked on breaking your own co-dependent patterns, but you don’t see him working on his stuff. Maybe he’s made promises he isn’t keeping, or the same old abusive or addictive behavior keeps coming back.

 

But you decide to stay anyway.

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What your friends and family say…

Your friends ask you, Why are you still with him? You don’t deserve the way he treats you!

And you nod and say things like, “I know, I know, but…”

Your mom shakes her head and says, “Sweetie, you shouldn’t put up with this.”

And you nod and say, “I know, I know, but…”

You DO know that he should treat you better, but you DON’T know if you deserve better. Your self esteem has taken a hit over all these years.

So you stay. And stay and stay.

For all the women who are staying, I hear you. Once you get home from coffee with your friend, and hang up the phone with your mom, you start silently answering her questions. They probably go something like this:

Why You Stay

  • The kids. You tell yourself that you can put up with anything to keep an “intact home.” You don’t want your kids to go through a divorce. You know that his punishing silence, his verbal abuse, and his coldness will have a negative affect on them, but you just can’t see how divorce would be any better.
  • I’m not ready. Oh My Laundry, if I knew the secret to readiness, I would sell it on e-Bay. But I don’t’. Every woman must decide when she is ready for something different, something better, something true and pure and holy and good. I know that I have repeated the same old broken cycle over and over again in my own life. All people do this. I will keep on doing this until one day I say to myself, “I’ve had enough. No matter what it costs me, I’m not repeating this again.” Like the prodigal son having a come-to-Jesus-moment, the switch is flipped and I’m ready for change. I’m not sure how many cycles you will have to repeat before your come-to-Jesus-moment, but I know for certain, when you are ready, it will happen.
  • Things will get worse. You say to yourself, “If I start saying no, enough is enough, and stop- he’ll make things worse for me.” You’ve always known this.  That’s why you quieted your voice and needs long ago. Intuitively, you have known that if you started speaking up for yourself, following through on your boundaries, and acting as if you really mattered, he was going to pull an even bigger stunt that would trump your boundaries and fulfill your greatest fear of abandonment.
  • I can’t make it on my own. You say to yourself that you’ve become so dependent on him financially and emotionally, that you just can’t see how you could make it on your own. You think to yourself that independence would be impossible to sustain.
  • I Still See Hope: There are times that the dream of him changing blinds reality. Even though evidence shows otherwise, you want to believe that there is still hope that he will change. That he will really love you the way you need.

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I am not writing this to talk you out of staying in a destructive relationship. Those kind of lectures just make a person feel guilty and week. GUILTY and WEAK, you are not! Through my work with women in destructive relationships, they must go through many cycles of deciding to stay-leave-stay-try-stay-pray- before they feel spiritually and physically released from their destructive relationship. I’m writing this to give you some coping strategies while you stay.

  • Pray. Everyday. No, don’t pray for your marriage. You’ve done that already. That’s a tired old record with a scratch. Pray everyday to have the mind of Christ. To be aligned with God’s word. To see God’s path and make bold steps to follow it. To be strengthened in hope, in faith, in love. Pray to cast out the worry, fear, self doubt and depression. Pray for spiritual and psychological protection. You ain’t got time for depression and abuse anymore.
  • Get Active. Feeling physically strong goes a long way to help feel emotionally strong too. Any act of kindness or effort toward yourself makes a difference, no matter how big or small. Walk, bike, swim, lift weights, join a class.
  • Read books on Co-dependency, Love addiction, and destructive marriages. Recognizing some of your own patterns and reactivity will help you make better choices in the heat of the moment. You know you can’t change him, but you can become the smartest, strongest, and best version of yourself possible.
  • Pray. Oh yeah, did I mention that already? Well, this time, ask your friends to pray for you too. There are spiritual things, behind the curtain of this material world that will not change unless your peeps pray for you. Call your praying friends to start praying specifically for the things you need. Asking friends for support is essential.
  • Invest in Your Own Thing. While you stay, make sure you are giving priority to your life, career, kids, and/or future. Get that extra education you need, go for that promotion, retrain and retool. Do something that broadens your world and your impact in it. Investing in yourself and your future gives you necessary power to re-infuse that syphoned-off self esteem.

Many women who decide to stay in destructive relationships feel impossibly trapped- like no decision they make is the right one. Well, I want to encourage you, that if you’ve decided to stay, for now, that there are still things you can do to help yourself. Any effort you put into helping yourself, even if it feels small, will go a long way.

Abusive, narcissistic, destructive relationships are terribly difficult to survive, and impossible to sustain while maintaining your own mental health. However, until you decide enough is enough, use these tips to help yourself day to day.

 

Conflict Resolution: Three Essentials to Turn Your Conflict Around

Recently I was asked to teach a Conflict Resolution class, to which I immediately said “YES, PLEASE!” Geesh, what a fantastic topic, fraught with drama and energy! Just think of all the sparks I can create. And you know how I like sparks. I’ve found that the growth, healing, and CHANGE we all desire comes out of the SPARK. So let’s talk about how to positively contain and maintain the energy created by the SPARK of conflict.

There are three presiding principles that I want my students to come away with. These principles will guide the entire class for the semester. They are easy to recall when you’re in the middle of a heated conflict and they have the power to change the way the conflict is going.

IT’S ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP, STUPID. During Bill Clinton’s 1992 successful presidential campaign, strategist James Carville coined “The economy, stupid” to focus the campaign volunteers on the main message. I think “It’s About the Relationship, Stupid” helps us focus on the relationship instead of the conflict. Sometimes we view the conflict as a face-off with the other person. But really, it is a natural, normal function of a relationship that both parties can face together. The couple faces the conflict, instead of the couple facing each other in the conflict.
Whatever you do, keep the focus on the relationship. Ask yourself what does the relationship need to make it through this conflict? An apology? A third party mediator? A compromise? It’s critical to remember that the relationship is much more important than the issue. After all, It’s About the Relationship, Stupid!

 

IT’S NOT ABOUT THE WHAT, IT’S ABOUT THE HOW. Often I will see corporate folks in my office who want to work on their communication and EQ (Emotional Quotient.) They have received some feedback from their supervisors and peers that they need help relating to other people on their team. They understand, plan and execute their work well (the WHAT,) but they have trouble communicating, collaborating and influencing their team (the HOW.) They tunnel-vision their way through life, for the sake of being right, isolating themselves from the people around them. Resolving conflict is often less about the CONTENT of what is being debated, and more about the PROCESS of how resolution is achieved. When you have a conflict with someone, you may be as right as rain and completely justified in your stance. However, if your style of communication makes the other party feel demeaned, inferior, dumb, or on the opposite side, you have lost the relationship. And remember, it’s About the Relationship, Stupid.

If being RIGHT trumps RELATIONSHIP, prepare yourself for a life of broken ones. However, if you learn to take the HOW seriously, there is nothing you can’t accomplish. The HOW is learning to communicate with humility, with inclusivity, and with open ended questions that draw people in, instead of pushing people away. Being willing to bend, to morph, and to expand your point of view communicates to the other person that you value what they bring to the table.

 

IT’S NOT A PROBLEM, IT’S AN OPPORTUNITY. Often, people are afraid of conflict because they associate conflict with something bad. Because of experiences within the Family of Origin, conflict could mean yelling, hitting, silence, withdrawal, break up, or cut off. These negative experiences with conflict can make people treat conflict like a major problem, instead of the opportunity it really is. Conflict is merely an opportunity to take the relationship to a new level of understanding, cooperation and even intimacy. There is no growth, no change, no success without the SPARK, and every relationship needs the SPARK. Conflict doesn’t have to be avoided, denied or obliterated. It should be recognized, and yes, even embraced as an opportunity to come closer. Conflict, when managed with the RELATIONSHIP and the HOW in mind, is merely a means of sharpening your character, your EQ, and your world view. It is an opportunity to widen your perspective, hone your empathy skills, and make you an expert in communication. The SPARK is not DARK! It is a GIFT with potential for great good. Conflict can be scary, just like a SPARK in dry grass. But once you know how to handle that SPARK, you can use its energy to create something new, different, and better. Whether it be a marriage, a team, a client relationship or a family, your ability to do SPARK MANAGEMENT with the RELATIONSHIP, the HOW, and the OPPORTUNITY in constant focus will energize your relationships for greater good.

 

If Relationships are a Dance, Here are 5 Essential Moves to Know

My husband took some friends and me dancing for my 40th birthday a while back. Any 80’s Material Girl will tell you that a party begins with the Pre-Party in the bathroom. Loud music, hot irons, nail polish, and 10 already-tried-on fashion fails littering the floor. Everything must be. Just. Right. Once I picked the dress, I called for backup from the baby sitter and my pre-teen daughters. Does this go together? Is this dress too tight? I swear it fit last year. Is it ok to wear these orthotics? No? Ok. Do I look, you know, old? Are panty hose in or out? I never know! What about my eye makeup? I’m going for smoky, does it look smoky? Or does it look like my crows feet are just choking? Hey, watch me do the Roger Rabbit- look! I still got it! Groan. Mom, go- you’re gonna be late! That night, we danced till my knees hurt, and then we danced some more.

Relationships are like that dance. We anticipate, we prepare, we get advice and then we dance. We pick our partner with hopes of reeling and laughing and closeness and love, and for a while, the dance is great. But as time goes on, and life’s demand’s increase, the dance gets harder. The steps become more complicated. More skill is required to maneuver the required steps.  We end up stepping all over each other’s toes with territorial ego and unchecked insecurities. We spin to the music, afraid our partner won’t actually catch us. We discover that other dance partners look better, stronger, safer. We compete and blame, and act a tough game. The dance floor becomes a boxing ring while each of us throw jabs and then hustle back to our corners. If the dance becomes too much of a struggle, we may leave the dance floor all together. Some of us think, “maybe I was never meant for dancing in the first place,” or “if I were a better dancer, my partner would love me,” or “If he were a better dancer, this would work.”

When we were children, our families were our first dance partners and our home was the dance floor. They showed us a certain way to dance, and that way became familiar to us. It may not have been loving, enjoyable, skilled or functional, but it was what we knew. Because we have imperfect families with imperfect parents, the dance got messy. Some of us even swore as youth, “I’ll never be like them when I grow up!”

As adults, however, we unwittingly attract the same kind of dance partners to our adult dance floor. They may not look the same or act the same, but they dance the same. They feel the same. We put ourselves in the same position we were always in, and we repeat the same messy dance that our parents taught us. Sometimes we turn into the very person we swore we never would. Sometimes we marry the type of person who most hurt us as children.

If you have been deeply wounded by the dance, I get it.  Maybe your childhood family system set you up for what looked like a mosh pit, not a dance floor. Maybe your family of origin looked like a middle school dance in the gym where the boys lined one side and the girls lined the other, and the “bad kids” were making out in the back. Maybe in your family, there was something wrong and weak about wanting closeness, so you had to get it in ways that seemed taboo. Or maybe your childhood family system was touch and go, hot and cold, unpredictable and chaotic. Families with addictions and mental illness can feel intensely bi-polar where love and war exist in the same breath. Whatever type of dance floor you learned your first steps, you can re-learn what you need to know for healthy, loving relationships today.

Start Dancing Well by answering these questions

  1. Recognize Your Dance Patterns: How did your family handle conflict, affection and communication? What negative habits have you brought from your family of origin to your current relationship? Do you avoid conflict or do you rush in with arguments? Are you afraid of intimacy or do you smother your partner? Recognize what you are doing to attract the wrong partner or to push good partners away.

  2. Recognize Your Partner’s Dance Patterns: If you have a partner, what family dance patterns did he/she learn growing up? What was his/her role in conflict? Rescuer, scapegoat, rebel, victim, abuser? How is your partner reacting to you in the dance?

  3. Own Your Broken Moves: You may have the moves like Jagger, but if the dance is broken, so are your moves. Look closely at your own contribution to the conflict in your relationship. Be careful and humble to own your broken part of the dance. Are you pushy, enabling, avoidant, passive, or checked out? Identify your part and seek real change

  4. Learn New Moves: You have the power to change yourself and start a new dance. You have the power to change the dynamics in your relationship for the better, even if you are the only one working on it. You are a learner and a doer, so give some attention to replacing ineffective dance moves with ones that really swing!

  5. Ask Your Partner to Dance Again: Once you have done the first four steps by making yourself emotionally healthy, it is time to offer a hand to your partner. Invite him/her to experience the safety, intimacy and joy of dancing with a healthy partner. Even though it’s hard to start again, take the first step by offering forgiveness, grace and friendship. You got this. Maybe you find that the dance is over, and you find yourself dancing alone with no partner in sight. Don’t worry, there are many others doing the same thing. It’s called Line Dancing, and it’s very fun!

You are a treasure and a delight, and you were made to dance. As far as it’s up to you, be the best dancer you can be. Be proud of the hard work you’ve accomplished to change negative patterns. Congratulate yourself on what you’ve accomplished so far in your emotional and spiritual growth. And Dance.

Do You Feel Trapped in a Toxic Relationship?

Have you ever gotten sucked into a relationship with someone who wasn’t good for you? Have you given the benefit of the doubt too many times, and ended up getting tricked? Have you ever felt duped or taken advantage of by someone you trusted?

Sometimes, for the sake of being nice, you may overlook red flags about someone’s personality. Maybe you don’t want to be judgmental or “mean” so you ignore someone’s glaring character flaws and get close to them anyway. Maybe something inside you warns you to keep your distance, but you are compelled to get closer anyway. Then, once you get to close to step away easily, trouble starts and you realize just how bad the person is for you.

People don’t realize they are putting themselves at risk for being used or abused when they ignore their inner warning signs. Sometimes we see the truth a little too late. For the next four weeks, I will be giving pointers on:

1) How to Use your Intuition and Red Flags when it comes to dealing with Users and Abusers

2) How to identify Users and Abusers and their characteristics

3) How to Set necessary boundaries for safety and good self care

4) How to help someone you know who is married to a User or Abuser

I know from first hand experience that ignoring warning signs leads us down a path that is often difficult, sometimes even dangerous to leave. Stiff consequences like empty bank accounts, wounded hearts and stained reputations result from partnering with the wrong people in relationships. Whether business, marriage, family or friendship, making wise relationship choices can save you from further damage.

This week we will start off with one of my most favorite pieces of classic literature- a witty poem that describes the lure of predatory relationships all too clear.

The Spider and the Fly
Mary Howitt

Will you walk into my parlour?” said the Spider to the Fly, 
‘Tis the prettiest little parlour that ever you did spy; 
The way into my parlour is up a winding stair, 
And I’ve a many curious things to show when you are there.” 
“Oh no, no,” said the little Fly, “to ask me is in vain, 
For who goes up your winding stair can ne’er come down again.” 

“I’m sure you must be weary, dear, with soaring up so high; 
Will you rest upon my little bed?” said the Spider to the Fly. 
“There are pretty curtains drawn around; the sheets are fine and thin, 
And if you like to rest awhile, I’ll snugly tuck you in!” 
Oh no, no,” said the little Fly, “for I’ve often heard it said, 
They never, never wake again, who sleep upon your bed!” 

Said the cunning Spider to the Fly, “Dear friend what can I do, 
To prove the warm affection I’ve always felt for you? 
I have within my pantry, good store of all that’s nice; 
I’m sure you’re very welcome — will you please to take a slice?” 
“Oh no, no,” said the little Fly, “kind Sir, that cannot be, 
I’ve heard what’s in your pantry, and I do not wish to see!” 

“Sweet creature!” said the Spider, “you’re witty and you’re wise, 
How handsome are your gauzy wings, how brilliant are your eyes! 
I’ve a little looking-glass upon my parlour shelf, 
If you’ll step in one moment, dear, you shall behold yourself.” 
“I thank you, gentle sir,” she said, “for what you ‘re pleased to say, 
And bidding you good morning now, I’ll call another day.” 

The Spider turned him round about, and went into his den, 
For well he knew the silly Fly would soon come back again: 
So he wove a subtle web, in a little corner sly, 
And set his table ready, to dine upon the Fly. 
Then he came out to his door again, and merrily did sing, 
“Come hither, hither, pretty Fly, with the pearl and silver wing; 
Your robes are green and purple — there’s a crest upon your head; 
Your eyes are like the diamond bright, but mine are dull as lead!” 

Alas, alas! how very soon this silly little Fly, 
Hearing his wily, flattering words, came slowly flitting by; 
With buzzing wings she hung aloft, then near and nearer drew, 
Thinking only of her brilliant eyes, and green and purple hue — 
Thinking only of her crested head — poor foolish thing! At last, 
Up jumped the cunning Spider, and fiercely held her fast. 
He dragged her up his winding stair, into his dismal den, 
Within his little parlour — but she ne’er came out again! 

And now dear little children, who may this story read, 
To idle, silly flattering words, I pray you ne’er give heed: 
Unto an evil counsellor, close heart and ear and eye, 
And take a lesson from this tale, of the Spider and the Fly.

My “Relationship Savvy” blog gives you tips, advice, and flippin’ fantastic feel-goods to help with your most difficult relationship challenges.

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