Tag Archives: Relationship

March 9, 2013 · 6:48 pm

Boundaries: If Your an Enabler, Don’t Cry When You Get Bit.


Aesop’s Fables records a story called the, “The Farmer and the Snake” that illustrates why boundaries are important to understand how to live life without rescuing people who may no be capable of rescue.

ONE WINTER a Farmer found a Snake stiff and frozen with cold. He had compassion on it, and taking it up, placed it in his bosom. The Snake was quickly revived by the warmth, and resuming its natural instincts, bit its benefactor, inflicting on him a mortal wound. “Oh,” cried the Farmer with his last breath, “I am rightly served for pitying a scoundrel.”

The greatest kindness will not bind the ungrateful [ self focused individuals].

A lesson to be learned here is that creating boundaries in life to regulate relationships and behaviors is a way to manage how much danger, pain, and dysfunction that you are going to experience in life.  We have boundaries at work, in business, on the highway, and even in the park, but somehow people believe that in relationships  everyone will always make the right decisions without clarifying the terms of relationship.

How Do We Get Into No-Win Situations Becoming an Enabler?

It may be hard to face, but enabling says something about the enabler that needs to be understood. People who are enablers think they are helping someone else when in reality they are creating a disability support system. It is magical thinking — a way of romanticizing life with the idealism that that denies the reality reality of  destructive patterns of behavior, irresponsibility, guilt, pain etc. The enabling parent, husband, wife-believes that somehow through these vicarious acts of rescuing and enabling that it will magically make it better.  It is like when a mother picks up her child and kisses the owee’ and magically all the pain disappears. It is a thinking problem that gets us into no-win situations.  In the core thought processes of the enabler there is a fundamental belief that this kind of thing happens to other people, but not to us– I am not like that–  believe the best about people, my family could not do anything like that. This attitude –thinking pattern– creates naivete’ about relationships that exposes your backside to the sharp teeth of the dog named fate –and when it happens, it is painful.

What Do Dogs Do in an Ideal World?

Like snakes ,when dogs are not kept on a leash and when there is not a understanding of how relationships will occur with individuals to regulate what can occur, it is an opportunity for disaster to happen naturally.  — and they do.  The problem with enablers is that they don’t believe ,snakes bite that dogs bark or pee on the corner of the sofa.  After all, they say, “my dog went to obedience school and knows better, he is a dog of high breeding.”  In an ideal world where people are perfectly balanced and have no dysfunction, family system problems, unresolved conflicts, or emotional baggage, people do not need to be on a leash, but we all know that snakes and dogs will always be true to their nature, no matter how pretty they are –too bad that life does not occur in a ideal world.

Translated by George Fyler Townsend. Aesop’s Fables (p. 19). Amazon Digital Services, Inc.

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December 23, 2011 · 5:19 pm

Finding Balance in Unbalanced Relationships: A Discussion about Conflicting Emotions.


GRL relationships

Think about relationships that you have with significant people in your life, what is the first word that comes to mind when you think of the people involved?  Is the word a reaction to how you feel about relationship or a descriptor of how interaction occurs between people?  Something to consider is whether others, in your world of relationships, would see your relationships in the same way that your mental image picture them.  If we are honest at this point, the reality is that everyone has problems at certain times in relationships and all families experience a certain level of malfunction at times.  One of the reasons is that we are feeling/emotive people and, at times,  our feelings distort perception of things occurring which results responses to perception that are charged with emotion and misinformation.  The result is reaction, unreasonable behaviors, conflict, and relationships that are fracture by misinformation, feelings out of control, and inappropriate responses.

It is difficult to use sound reasoning when events are charged with distorted emotional thoughts. 

Consider this question: Is it reasonable to believe someone who tells you that they love you, while at the same time that person in hateful, vindictive, and spiteful ways at the same time.  Obviously, behavior that is inconsistent with what a person tells to you is a strong indicator that something is out of sync in the relationship.  Unbalanced relationships are plagued with behavioral cues that tells the informed observer that this behavior indicates that relationships are unbalanced and lack appropriate boundaries.  This is especially true when there is love espoused, while at the same time the person is demonstrating toxic, damaging, or abusive behaviors toward the person who is the object of their love-hate relationship.  Many instances of this can be seen among  couples who engage in extra-marital affairs, i.e., this is a commonly demonstrated behavior.  The conundrum is that there is a professed love professed for the spouse, while a toxic behavior occurs toward the spouse, as well as, the overall relationship.  I think that everyone would agree that this constitutes an unhealthy and unbalanced relationship.  The idea that a person can love one person and at the same time  engage in a clandestine relationship suggests that there is a conflict of how emotions are understood and what love really means within a relationship.  Consequently, the person who confesses love and fails to demonstrate values consistent with love is action on a faulty presumption of how love is characterized between two people in a relationship.   Another way of understanding the unbalanced conflict of rational thinking about love is in filial relationships.  A question comes to the surface here: Can I love someone while secretly harboring resentment toward them, holding on to unforgiveness while at the same time, acting out passive- aggressive anger toward a friend or relative?  Quite often, people communicate that they are angry without ever saying it. What it reveals is an unhealthy pattern of relating to other when emotional conflicts occur.  It is abundantly clear is that relationships do get unbalanced, but if individuals want to have reasonable ways in life to manage the conflicting emotions felt and and potential for unhealthy patterns of relating; it means having healthy boundaries and effective ways to manage the unmanageable problem of unbalanced emotional responses must become a priority.

Crisis should bring people together and not keep them apart.

During changes in life stages and the unexpected stressors that are a part of life change many feelings come to the surface and individuals are often exposed to the possibility of facing conflicting emotions.  While struggling with what to do and managing unbalanced relationship issues that result from very normal life issues, people are face with real life choices that are at times very difficult.  For example, many who have lost a loved one deal with emptiness, grief over the loss, as well as feelings of isolation, which bring to the surface unrealized emotional expectations for themselves and others  For others, the season of change brings issues to the surface, which has been placed, on hold in the file of unresolved issues and unanswered questions.  Others are facing reassignment from military duty, the effects of the economy, loss of jobs– homes, which bring to the surface the emotional pain that people are experiencing because of the conditions of life  being experienced.

An emotional crisis is an opportunity to add positive value and resolution to relationships.

I remember a story that my dad used to tell about two brothers who had become angry at one another early on in life and had avoided each other, through most of life—both being unwilling to take a step toward reconciliation.  As the story goes, one of the brothers became deathly ill, was placed in the hospital—the other brother went to see him and because of the grave nature of the illness and the possibility of the brother dying, they agreed to bury the hatchet.  After talking and renewing the relationship, it was time to leave.  The brother who was sick, the patient in the hospital, said to departing brother; “by the way, if I live the feud is still on.” Unfortunately, many people cannot break away from the self-defeating behavior that creates a no win situation and feeds off of the feud, the conflict, and an inability to ever reconcile life in a healthy way.

Balancing relationships is about making the right choices for you.

The lived experience for many people is one fueled by conflicts that are unresolved and in fact, may never be solved.  Divorce, broken families, a family member in prison, poverty, child abuse, homelessness, and sickness are all deeply felt issues –the source of painful experiences that are a source for emotional conflict during the seasons of life.  At a time in life when conflicting emotions are magnified by natural events, it is  a perfect time for imbalance to erupt or a time to balance something that feels out of balance by making a choice to act on the felt experience of hopelessness. If we can wrap our head around the fact that even though life is very difficult that there is still hope to balance unbalanced relationships and embrace life with a hope that elevates life and those around us.  I do not know what you are experiencing in life, but if we can focus our thoughts Christ, who is our hope ; then  the peace that He can bring to life can bring balance to seems so out of balance in our experience of life.  Unfortunately, many people’s attention will focus around unbalanced relationships, what has been lost, or what is wrong with others and life.  Fortunately, hope for balance in the midst of conflict is possible through trusting in Savior who is larger than life and greater than problems.  When Christ comes to our life, it is not to abandon us in the moment of conflict or to magnify our failures; it is a happens to magnify the power of Christ to  bring freedom from a life without a balanced hope in the experiences of life. A relationship with Christ is a reminder that He gives us the opportunity, motive, and place to a be peacemaker.

Indeed, people can have the language right, the ritual right, but the reality is that our audio needs to match our video.  However, the crisis that we experience is what reveals who we are going to trust when life gets out of kilter.  An important thing to consider is whether our relationship with Christ is having an impact on the way we handle unbalanced relationships and experiences.   Is what we are saying –experiencing on the inside having a significant impact upon the lived experience of life?  It is good sometimes to just be confessional and stop denying what we feel because pushing down emotions, conflicts, and unresolved pain only pushes issues to the surface when stress is placed upon life.  The act of denying the reality of an internal condition guarantees an undesirable future prospect of artificial existence that will be characterized by the appearance of functionality.  Unfortunately, life will be expressed and may look good on the outside, but the inner dialogue of pain, frustration, and unbalanced emotions will influence life and relationships.

Exercising your options to make good choices starts with individual choice.

What is a person to do about the conflicting emotions and unbalanced relationships in life?  First, understand that there is only one person that you can change—the person that you see in the mirror each day.  Next, realize that it is not your responsibility to fix other people, change them, and you are not responsible for what others do or life they create.  Also, recognize that much of what people feel about disappointments in life stems from faulty expectations and misplaced trust.  Then, allowing people the grace to be who they are and work it out individually, releases others into God’s care to be who they are while still loving them– even though you may not agree.  Accepting others disappointing acts is not ratifying what has been done in a passive form of acceptance, it is allowing others to be free to choose what they do– placing responsibility for behaviors on the person making the choice.  Finally,say it, “I am not responsible, and it is not my fault”.

Is it possible to love someone and hate what they do, be in love with one person and maintain loyalty and admiration for others?  The answer depends upon you and how life is balanced within boundaries to manage the unmanageable things in life.  Remember, we are not responsible for what others choose to do and it is not our fault.  One of the sources of balance comes in how a person thinks about life.  For linear, black and white, everything fits in the box—literal, concrete thinkers, this will not compute because it requires thinking about life outside  of the box:  “most of the time your brain is involved in just one of three activities: distraction, reaction, or following well-worn pattern” (Tim Hurson). In the Bible it says, “As a man thinketh in his heart so is he”.  Are you following a well-worn pattern in life or are you interested in balancing how you feel about your relationships in life:  Change your thoughts and change your life.

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December 7, 2010 · 7:14 pm

Finding a Balance in Second Marriages and Family Relationships


finding balance

What is the lived-experience of individuals who experience the loss of a spouse and then decides to remarry?  Until you have had the experience of having to reconstruct life from the ashes of what has been, you may not know what it takes to put humpty back together again.

Unfortunately, the adjustment-experience of widowed couples who remarry  is characterized by much misunderstanding, which brings to the surface feelings and struggles experienced in readjustment.  After talking with couples who have remarried at an advanced age, it is very clear that it is difficult to find balance in relationships while adjusting to life in a blended family.  The sad fact is that a contributing reason for high occurrences of divorce in second marriages relates to the tension between the marriage partners and family members that stems from difficulty in adapting to changes.  During holiday season celebrations, adjustment issues become magnified by charged emotions that are associated with memories, the importance of traditions, and expectations about what should happen.  There is little doubt that a great sense of security, as well as, well-being in relationships  comes from striking a balance between self-protection and extending grace to others through acceptance.

A general truth and disclaimer is that the mental health and state of persons involved, as well as, family systems functionality will impact all relationships– especially when stress is placed on life that distorts perceptions about what is happening.   Distorted beliefs and individual perspective is a central factor, which influences behaviors by individuals expressing protecting behaviors which is a defense mechanism demonstrating embedded beliefs about what has changed.  At the heart of strained relationships is a pronounced difference in values i.e., what each person believes is most important.  A simple way to understand this is when individuals differ about important traditions, rites, and holiday events; there is a stark difference in what people believe to be true about events.  Anger is a typical response and the form it takes is aggression, but unfortunately, in many cases it is not dealt with constructively and demonstrates passive aggressive attempts to manipulate or punish others.

What are some of the sources for anger in people who make up the extended family when a remarriage occurs?

The Fear of Abandonment and Isolation: Often people fear they will not be needed as much in a relationship or they will lose their sense of importance when the people dynamics of relationships change.  The fear felt is of being pushed aside.  Being left in a lonely feeling of limbo is one the factors in why widows and widowers become such an enormous burden for everyone after the spouse dies because they cling to existing  relationships.  Why?  Because they are alone and have lost the spousal support system, which leaves them feeling detached socially, emotionally, and psychologically.  A common result is that unhealthy attachments are formed and a result is widows/widowers become overly dependent upon other significant family members for the basic support needed.  Unfortunately, the outcome is an unhealthy relationship dynamic is created dissolving existing boundaries, which confuses roles and expectations in relationships on everyone’s part.  One thing that children and other family members may not understand is that no other person can meet the relationship need that a widow/widower has like a spouse.  Remarriage is not replacement of a former spouse or other family; it is a transition away from an unhealthy attachment, which has occurred through a time of tragedy.  A fundamental truth is that relationships must be in balance and have healthy boundaries to be effective for all.  The reason that remarriage is important to widowers/widows is that they are alone.  While everyone else has the need-meeting source of relationship with a partner in life, the surviving spouse feels empty and alone.  What others may not see is that even though family may love them very much, they cannot meet that need.  When life is out of balance, it does not work for anyone.

Unhealthy Attachments: When relationships are out of balance and boundaries are skewed by unhealthy attachment after a death occurs, parties on all sides have a fear of being abandoned.  This often presents in unhealthy relationship dynamics that triggers a chain of toxic, and many times,  destructive behaviors which can permanently alter or destroy life-long relationships. Underneath this relationship pattern is a fear that family members who have become accustomed to having 100% of the Mother or Father’s attention, suddenly has to adjust to an unwanted change.  What is not accepted is the social changes that death has brought into a system of relationships.  Resistance to change is a component of the grief process, which has not been accepted nor addressed.  It may be that family members accept that death has come to someone very important, but there has not been acceptance of what this means to the lived-experience of relationships, as well as future development as a family –a social unit.  Personal identity that defines the social world people live in is forever changed, as well as, all future developments when death occurs.  A normal response from denial is to try to hang on to the past to try to control something we do not understand i.e., something that has not been fully accepted.  When security in relationships faces the threat of change, a natural response is anxiety that creates a felt-need to control life in efforts to dispel a perceived feeling of loss of control.

Psychosocial Disruptions:  There is no doubt by theorists that “abandonment” issues are at the heart of many mental health problems.  Most parents learn the importance of proper attachment relationships when raising small children.  However, that sad fact reveals it is not clearly understood how attachment is related to perceived identity issues, as well as, adjusting to changing roles and expectations in a family system resulting from remarriage.  A fact not understood is that social identity and feelings of security are instantly impacted as life-developments like death, divorce, and remarriage occur.  These developmental changes that are a natural part of the flow of life take place and should be expected.  Consequently, when there is a closed family system that includes mental health issues i.e., unresolved or mismanaged, a potential result that must be anticipated is psychosocial disruption of a family system resulting in relationship dysfunction.  At the core of disruption is fear of rejection, isolation, and loss of emotional support connected to security felt from the comfortable ideas of what life was in the past.  The critical issue to understand is how individuals negotiate change in the present and what a family system does in response to changes in life, roles, identity, and relationship challenges in a family system.

Unhealthy and Uninformed Choices Motivated by Fear of Loss: Life is about choices and when a behavior is chosen, the outcome is chosen.  In families, more thought needs to be given to consequences, of even a solitary action in a process of change.  When fear drives insecurities in the direction of destructive choices, a good question to ponder is if people understand the broad effect that behaviors have upon family, friends, and children. When a family member behaves badly after someone looses a spouse, is divorced, or remarries; is there awareness that the response to the fear of change, the loss of control, and unresolved grief is affecting every area and all relationships in life.  The simple truth is that selfish choices result in heartache for everyone.  A point to consider about choices, behavior, and outcome is that if you are in this boat, you are creating the world you live in every day by the choices that you are making.

Some advice to consider is that if you are in a family that is disabled by the fear of changes examine your fears to see if they are even rational; then face them.  If a relationship is that important to you, the way to make it better is not to live captive to fear.  Christmas is the season that is approaching and is an ideal time to ask God to bring peace to your family, your relationships, and your experiences. Obviously, staying angry is your choice and ultimately will only widen the gap between you and the relationship you want.  All you have to do is to make the right choice to get the right response.  Relationships are not about winning or about control, they are about loving relationships with healthy boundaries that make life effective.  When people can accept the fact that the dynamics of relationships have changed, through a divorce, death, or remarriage; then there is the potential that fear will be dispelled, change can be managed and relationships can develop into healthy outcomes.

There is a balance between self-protection and extending ourselves in developing relationships.  If living in the grip of your fears is not working for you, then maybe you should try a different approach.  You may be surprised that your fears are false and when you begin to build instead of tear down, felt-needs for relationship and security may be resolved very quickly.

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