It’s About Making Babies!

NML has been covering relationships on Baggage Reclaim, especially toxic relationships for quite some time. She has written books and tons of articles, and even offered advice, a time or two. Today she reminds us that questions of our partner-prospect have to be contextual – that he or she has to be well respected in the community – and respectful and worthy of our respect at home, too.

One comment to NML’s article brought something to mind. When someone is helpful and kind at church, work, or in public, but harsh, unyielding, or even abusive at home – that, to me, suggests disrespect for her/his parents.

The enemy?

Traditionally we think that we treat enemies and allies – friends and dangerous people – differently. Towards one we practice defense, we may actively work to practice harm on some. Toward the other we support, nurture, and try to build up good will. Well-adjusted people will be courteous to friends, hostile to enemies; confused people may get the relationships and reactions confused.

Why couple?

We come together in couples because that is how we were raised. Most of us in the Western world were raised by parents in a home environment. We spent a childhood learning to be children in the culture – the practices, traditions, and values that our parents inherited or chose – and learned what adults are and do from watching our parents. Those that grew to respect their parents find that much of that home culture stays with them, and they bring that cultural background when they choose a partner, and begin to merge their home culture with their partner’s home culture, choosing their practices, values, and traditions from what their families taught, and what they choose from their life experiences.

People that grow up respecting their family and home culture, will be drawn to find a mate, and make a home. Some will take on family roles that mimic their parents because they choose to, others because they unthinkingly echo what they saw and learned as children, and passively repeat their history.

This is where the “Oh, my! I have become my Mother/Father! I swore I never would do that!” thing comes from. This most often happens as we take on a parent’s responsibility for enforcing discipline and etiquette in the home.

The downside

So, what happens when Daddy was confused – or under the influence – and instead of imposing discipline (the will to complete a task) on the household, instead applies force and other forms of coercion for momentary convenience, or to feel in control of something or someone – or that actively enjoys abusing others? If the acting out is only done at home – then the lesson is that behavior in public must be courteous, but at home an unthinking Tyrant is appropriate.

And you wind up with a partner that the community sees as a “good” person, that turns into an ogre at home.

What to do

The answer is to get to know someone before considering them as a partner prospect. Know their family and family history – if you end up together – his or her family will be providing a lot of cultural impact on the home you build, and their impact on you and your home in the future, as well.

Look for problems with roles in the family. Undue disrespect, tyranny, or substance abuse are all red flags. Does he/she respect and trust his/her family? Are the significant events of his/her childhood the adventures of a confident child, or traumas/dramas enacted with the parents? Did most of her/his siblings (brothers and sisters) learn basic discipline (will to complete a task), courtesy and respect, honor and honesty?

The risk

The risk, of course, is that the partner-prospect comes to treat you less like a neighbor (with courtesy) and more like the warfare she/he learned as a child, that is what “home” means to her/him.

Can people from bad homes, inept parents or families damaged by substance abuse, be good mates and co-parents? Certainly – if they have dealt with the cultural baggage of their childhood, if they acknowledge their challenges for healthy family living, and actively choose and reexamine their lives continuously, so that they actively take responsibility for their actions and relationships, and choose to modify their early training to be disciplined, honorable, trustworthy, and in all ways a partner of character and good will. Not that many people put that kind of attention into their lives, voluntarily.

Choose wisely

What is unfortunate, is that almost all families are dysfunctional in some fashion. Kids grow up, and rebel against the authoritarian discipline that good parents impose. And, today, fashion and mass entertainment have established the fact that sex is for recreation – indeed, social and governmental mores are stringent, about keeping children from learning about using sexual congress to fulfill family roles – to make a baby. From separate rooms imposed by housing regulations, to refusal to discuss conjugal relations in direct terms in public, for several generations we have let mass media, fashion, and marketing take intimacy away from the family experience, for most families.

The likelihood that a promising prospect considers sex as a recreation, and perhaps the sole reason for bothering with a relationship (a perpetual dater), is unfortunately high. Making a home with such a person is going to be a rough experience anyway, as the realities of changing roles and responsibilities as we form a home and family will come as rude shocks – since the home wasn’t their goal in the first place.

Whether the prospect wanted a home or not – if all they know of family life is twisted from a desired secure and safe, disciplined nurturing environment, then the odds of a happy home are terrible. This is but one of many problems we cannot “fix” in a mate. It would be rude and unfair to them, and unhealthy for us, to try. “Good emotional bonds to family, friends, and co-workers.” It still seems like good advice.

Just remember, it is a danger flag, if he/she starts treating you more like a battlefield opponent as you get closer together. Instead, you want someone that believes the home is a happy place, with trusted people of good character caring for and nurturing each other.

Blessed be.

NML writes about Getting Your Wake Up Call: Relationship Epiphanies.

NML relates how a sequence of epiphany moments build up to an epiphany relationship.

Reading her premise, I was struck by what I suspect is the underlying philosophy.

Change is measured in pain. Real change is always traumatic, by definition. The Tarot describes change as a little death, a clearing away of the life, the beliefs, the values and the priorities from before the change. After the change lies a new perspective on life and opportunities, and a changed understanding of truth and reality.

What NML considers an epiphany moment might also be considered a false truth being recognized for being false. When we think that being aware of our partner’s wants and needs, and quietly going about meeting them, we might overlook how slighting ourselves taints the relationship. So while we strive to be accommodating – we set ourselves, and our partner, up for rebellion.

But what if we realize at some point, that our efforts are wasted? That the more we try to accommodate, the unhappier our partner, and our relationship gets? It is possible, but unlikely, we would realize the underlying misconception – that we need to take care of ourselves and our partner.

I might call this conservation of change. That is, when confronted with a disconnect between reality and our world view, we tend to apply the least amount of change and update to our world view.

In a relationship this leads to a reluctance to leave. With a good, healthy, and appropriate (for us) partner, this is good. It gives a relationship a chance to weather adversity and turmoil. With a dysfunctional partner – abusive, disrespectful, or emotionally unavailable (or combination) – it keeps the abused partner around long after the relationship becomes an active source of hurt and injury.

Firesign Theater did a skit years ago about “Everything you know is wrong.” This is absurd. We know, for instance, that water is wet, that mom’s spit cleans faces, and that caring for a pet lengthens lives. Except, there are times when even that has to be qualified. Water freezes. A pet cougar or lion, or alligator will grow and might not lengthen one’s life at all, at all. (MomSpit No-Rinse Cleanser for Hands and Face 2oz Lemon and White Tea by “MomSpit, Inspired by the Original”, though, sells on Amazon.com.)

We are reluctant to look beyond the first “fact” that contributes to things gone awry. We “fix” it and go on. We experience our epiphany, we say, “Wow, that was something I thought was true, but isn’t.” We discover a new truth for us, and consider the problem fixed.

In science class I learned about a “scientific method” that was fundamental to the creation of modern science. In the US Navy, we were taught a “six step troubleshooting method” that embodied the same six steps. Google lists many different versions for “six step troubleshooting”. One is a PDF file, that lists the six steps as: Verify the complaint; Determine the related symptoms; Analyze the symptoms; Isolate the trouble; Fix the problem; and lastly Verify proper operation. Yes, this happens to be an AutoShop101.com procedure to deal with electrical problems. Of all the various versions of the “six step” or scientific method, the first starts with verifying the problem or complaint can still be observed, the next three understand the symptoms and identify where the problem lies, the fifth is to make a fix, and the six is always to go back and check to see if all of the problem has actually been corrected.

Considering the fifth and sixth steps part of “problem solving” has been an important philosophical change in many technical areas. Where I can hear my tractor motor run rough, and reach down and adjust the carburetor, I might be jumping to a conclusion about what is amiss. But I will adjust, and if that doesn’t fix the issue – I know I am not done, yet.

We can do that with or daily lives, too. We can consider “fixing” a problem the next-to-last step, instead of the finishing touch.

We can try out the “fix”, to see if it really did correct all of the problem. If not, we can go back, adjust our analysis, and try again to “isolate the problem” (that is, figure out what is broken).

Conservation of change is a powerful force in people’s lives. We correct, we question, the little things first. We change the stuff that is least embarrassing, the least noticeable by others, first. We fear letting others see our mistake, we fear looking foolish – and we have difficulty dealing with the fact that the love we learned at home, the role models we take for truth – are flawed.

So our journey from pain to truth comes in steps. We wait for new people and situations to teach us the rest of the lesson we skip over when we can. Until, finally, we have whittled away all the false starts, and distracting sidelights of the problem, and discover a significant issue. The small issue “epiphany moments” have cleared the detritus, so we find ourselves facing a new path, a different perspective, a changed understanding of love and relationship. And we find there is no gentle or quiet way to accommodate such a change in reality, with our current partner. Because such a moment shows us that we picked an unsuitable partner. That we want a fundamentally different kind of relationship, with different role for ourselves and our partner. That is, I think, what NML calls an “epiphany relationship.”

Part of the delay, of the succession of epiphany moments before we make a life change, is a learning process. We test, we check, we confront what we think is broken, and evaluate various fixes. It takes continued persistence of the problem to elevate what we consider to be “the problem”, to something with far-reaching effects.

Part of the delay, the stepwise approach to real change, is a need to believe what we have been taught. We are reluctant to face the large disconnects between what we need, and what we have been led to ask for.

There is an aspect of honor for those we learned from. How can we respect and honor Dad, and believe that his passive-aggressive behavior is bad for a relationship? How can we respect and admire Mom, and recognize that her gossip and disrespectful ways are abusive?

So we are brought, by life or the love of good people, to a better understanding of wider truths. Change is measured in pain; it isn’t a pretty or a happy journey.

Blessed be.