If Only...

Most times clients come into the office and their issues are centered around relationships. Even if they are struggling at work, it is usually the problems that center around the interpersonal dynamics that go on at work. Relationship issues can come in all different shapes and sizes. They can be issues that lie within the nuclear family, a marriage, with children, a significant other, friends, or with our coworkers.
Many times as people begin their work, the focus often becomes, “if only he/she would change and do this or that different, then I would be fine.
There is a central theme that underlies all of these sessions. It is one of boundaries. It is the erroneous perception that the relationships that we are in are what need to change and are the reasons for our unhappiness, or feelings of powerlessness, our real reason we can’t change.
We function in all the different areas of our lives as a system. So, yes the behavior of one does effect the behavior of another and vice versa. Yet to set out to make change in this system, the only one that you have any control over to precipitate change in that system is you.
Now I am sure at this point people are saying what about abusive situations. Abusers use emotional abuse and other ways to obtain control over those around them.
Yes, this is true. But the answer to change the dynamic is still the same, you the individual must take responsibility to do your part to create a change in the system. Even if it means that the work that you do is to find a way to get out of that relationship.

One thing we often forget is, when we get into relationships, we bring all the baggage from our childhood and any other relationships that we may have been in, in the past, into this relationship.
When we struggle today, with feeling like we are stuck, that the people we are around just don’t allow us to grow, we have to take a look inside of ourselves and ask, how did these people came to be in our lives in the first place.

We move toward what is familiar. So for the most part, while the people in our lives may be very different we are going to engage in very similar interactive struggle with them.

We bring with us our own insecurities and our neurosis into this new relationship. We feel “compatible with” the person who at first glance comforts those insecurities. We look to them to be the one that fills our “voids”.
If it was all that simple, then life would be simple.

Life isn’t simple.

Relationships are complex. They consist of not just one set of personalities, desires and baggage, but two. It is not so simple that one person presents their issues only and the other person resolves or comforts them. Each and every person in the system must get their perceived needs met in order to make it work.

When we can each say, yes I have my role in how all of this plays out, I too am a part of this system, I need to take responsibility for my own baggage, then real change can begin to occur.
Sometimes only one person is looking to make change and so they say, how can I change if the others won’t participate.
I say, “change in one brings change in the system”.
Go about making change for yourself, the systems in which you are in will change as well. There is no way to predict what that change will be, if it is to be for the better or not, but if you continue to work on you, no matter what the result, you will be in a better position personally to deal with what ever comes up.
When we are simply sitting with our stuckness and saying, there is no way my life can change because of this person or that person, then stuck we will stay.

Here are some examples of looking at a situation in two different ways:

“The kids are running all over the place and it is making me anxious. I am anxious because of their behavior”.
Or, you can say, “I am feeling anxious now. What can I do to relieve that anxiety because I have to attend to the kids and either step in and halt their behavior if inappropriate or step back and realize, that what they are doing really isn’t inappropriate at all, it was just something I couldn’t deal with because of my anxiety”.

The first situation is saying, if only the kids would just stop running, I wouldn’t feel anxious.
The second situation says, if only I wasn’t anxious, I would be better able to deal with the kids.

Another example might be this:

“I only yell because he doesn’t hear me when I talk. I feel like I am talking to the wall. Sometimes I get short with him and my words can be cutting and condescending, but it is the only time he listens and actually starts to get things done”.

Or, I use yelling and a condescending tone because I have not learned a more effective way of communicating what I want from him. I know that yelling, while it gets me what I want, is not a healthy way to deal with these situations”.

So how is this all about boundaries. When we set healthy boundaries around ourselves and take good care of ourselves, work through our own stuff, we make for being a healthier part of any system that we may participate.

(to be continued)…