Crossroads Conversations

Joe is driving home from work. Something important happened today, and he really wants to tell his wife about it. When he walks in the door, Sue is on the phone with her girlfriend. She is laughing, sharing deeply, and obviously enjoying their conversation. 20 minutes pass before she gets off the phone, and all the while, Joe's anxiety and frustration is hard to manage.

At any conflict/stress moment if your relationship with your spouse, you can take on of these three paths:

1. Attack or defend: You express some element of what you are experiencing, but in the form of a complaint that has the effect of coercing, criticizing, or retaliating.

"How come you always have so much to say to your friends, and so little to say to me?"

This turns your partner into the enemy, and triggers an "adversarial cycle." Each partner stings in response to being stung. Each feels too unheard to listen, too misunderstood to being misunderstanding. There is always another rebuttal.

2. Avoid, ignore, or downplay: You keep what you are experiencing to yourself and talk about something else.

"Anything good on TV tonight?"

This turns your partner into a stronger, and triggers a withdrawn cycle. Each partner's carefulness, politeness, or walking on eggshells stimulates the same in the other. Whispering stimulates whispering.

3. Confide and listen: You bring your partner in on what you are experiencing; you take in what your partner is trying to tell you.

"I'm jealous of how much fun you were having talking to Gail over the phone just now."

(You're not saying this to make them feel guilty, or spur them to action. You are being honest about what is true in your heart.)

This turns your partner into an ally, and triggers an empathetic or collaborative cycle. Each partner's confiding, admitting, reaching out, and considering the others viewpoint makes the other automatically do the same.

Being intimate is bringing your spouse IN on what you are feeling and struggling with in the moment. It does not require a certain feeling. Intimacy is just a sentence away, but it is hard to come up with that sentence. It is hard because we are not very aware of our own internal states--and mostly we am fighting off our shame.

Based on the work of Daniel Wile

Turtle Park

A couple of weeks ago when Aunt Becca was in town we met at Turtle Park for a little cousin fun:








































































































Isn't he the cutest lil' peanut?

Why the Toothpaste is a Big Deal

You stumble into the bathroom, and there it is.

The toothpaste tube laying on its side, no top, squeezed in the middle.

How many years have you been married? How many times have you made it clear that you like it squeezed from the bottom? As you flatten again, you begin to think, "I'm not sure I really matter to her/him." The proof is there on the bathroom counter the next morning too… and the next.

You bring it up. (maybe even explode) "I'm so tired of asking you to squeeze the toothpaste from the bottom. (!!!xxx#$!!!)" Or maybe it's cloaked in sarcasm. "You'd think after 5 (10, 15, 20) years of marriage, you would have learned how to squeeze the toothpaste right." Your spouse gets angry that you are making such a big deal of the *** toothpaste. You are both convinced that the other is an unloving nincompoop.

You stop mentioning the toothpaste. And a dozen other little things. Socks. Unflushed toilets. Unwiped countertops... insert your own issue. Why bother? They don’t really care anyhow. You shut up and withdraw. You stop talking in the name of peace. Maybe you are ashamed that the toothpaste matters to you. Maybe you convince yourself that it's ok… a mature adult should be able to deal with the idiosyncrasies of a nitwit. But everyday, you see the tube… and something is happening emotionally, driving a wedge.

Is this really about toothpaste?

Do I matter? Do my emotions count? What your heart really wanted, from the first day of the toothpaste incident, is that your spouse would affirm again, "You really matter to me. I want to remember the little things that are important to you." But in the fight-over-the-toothpaste-that-was-never-about- toothpaste, your connection to the other is diminished over again and again. The heart of the matter…being affirmed that you are important to them…keeps getting missed. A slow downward spiral of distance happens day after day.

What would have happened if the conversation went differently? What if you had realized from the start that it was about your heart? What if you'd talked about your heart instead of the toothpaste? What if your spouse knew that you needed love more than a flat tube?

Maybe it's time to have a new kind of conversation.

[Hear more about this perspective in Hold Me Tight, Seven Conversations for a Lifetime of Love, by Dr. Sue Johnson, who is the developer of Emotionally Focused Couples Therapy.]

Deeper Still

Deeper Still

In the tears you gave to me


I found a river to an ocean


A concrete sky and a stone cold sea


That came to where the emptiness cracked open


And all my fears came crashing through


And met the fire of my sorrow


But I found my strength in forgiving you


I never even dreamed how far my heart could go



To give my life beyond each death


From this deeper well of trust


To know that when there's nothing left


You will always have what you gave to love



In this life, the love you give becomes

the only lasting treasure


And what you lose will be what you win


A well that echoes down too deep to measure



A silver coin rings down that well


You could never spend too much, a diamond echoes deeper still


And you'll always have what you gave to love,


You will always have what you gave to love


David Wilcox & Beth Nielsen Chapman, What You Whispered CD

David Wilcox gets something here about marriage. There is goodness in the struggle; the good marriage isn't primarily about joy and happiness and mutual pleasure, not that those things don't happen. But that's not the measure of a good marriage. He sees that we become fuller people as we give because we love. We are stretched beyond what we thought possible, even though there is a cost, and that it's worth it. Reread the lyrics again, thinking about marriage...

On Falling in Love & "Prenuptial Panic"

"Falling in love is something people can't really do until they first learn the skills of friendship."

"One of the greatest pains of love is that one of us always gets there first and must patiently wait for the other to catch up. We can work on our friendship skills while we are waiting. We dare not try to fall in love in order to be made happy. We get happy, and then we fall in love to share it."

"Anyone who doesn't feel a bit of panic at the point of making such a total permanent commitment either doesn't mean it or is not paying attention. Yet years later, in the throes of an old, open conflict or a new, secret romance, those who would run from their marriage always remember the sprint not taken on their wedding day. They don't realize it is universal. The function of all the well-dressed wedding guests is to keep the bride and groom from cutting and running..."

What is a Good Marriage 2

More on marriage...

"Marriage is not supposed to make you happy. It is supposed to make you married. Once you are safely and totally married, then you have a structure of security and support from which you are free to make yourself happy, rather than wasting your adulthood looking for structure."

"The creation of partnership, companionship, and even friendship--is impossible if one or both partners insist on being right." As one client once realized, "You're telling me that I can't be right and married at the same time?" RIGHT. A married person must respect the partner's opinions, emotional reactions, preferences, and points of view without applying a standard of right or wrong to them... the course of the marriage, like the course of true love, never did run smoothly, and isn't supposed to."

What Is a Good Marrige?

Marriage is our last, best chance to grow up. --Joseph Barth

I didn't marry you because you were perfect. I didn't even marry you because I loved you. I married you because you gave me a promise. That promise made up for your faults. And the promise I gave you made up for mine. Two imperfect people got married and it was the promise that made the marriage. And when our children were growing up, it wasn't a house that protected them; and it wasn't our love that protected them-- it was the promise.
--Thornton Wilder, The Skin of our Teeth

Here I'd like to begin posting some thought-provoking thoughts on marriage.
Let your thoughts be provoked. Tell me about it:)

Remember the Tinman

This Tracey Chapman song so captures the killing of the heart and the fight to win it back...

Remember the Tinman

There are locks on the doors
And chains stretched across all the entries to the inside
There's a gate and a fence
And bars to protect from only God knows what lurks outside

Who stole your heart, left you with a space
That no one and nothing can fill?
Who stole your heart? Who took it away
Knowing that without it you can't live?

Who took away the part so essential to the whole
Left you a hollow body
Skin and bone
What robber what thief who stole your heart and the key

Who stole your heart
The smile from your face
The innocence the light from your eyes
Who stole your heart? Or did you give it away?
And if so then when and why?

Now all sentiment is gone
Now you have no trust in no one

Who stole your heart
Did you know but forget the method and moment in time
Was it a trickster using mirrors and slight of hand?
A strong elixir or a portion that you drank?

Who hurt your heart
Bruised it in a place
That no one and nothing can heal
You've gone to wizards, princes and magic men
You've gone to witches, the good the bad the indifferent

But still all sentiment is gone
But still you have no trust in no one

If you can tear down the walls
Throw your armor away, remove all roadblocks, barricades
If you can forget there are bandits and dragons to slay
And don't forget that you defend an empty space

And remember the Tinman
Found he had what he thought he lack
Remember the Tinman
Go find your heart and take it back

Who stole your heart
Maybe no one can say
One day you will find it I pray...

Real Apology?

Can you make out the words? Couldn't seem to make it bigger.






Mouse: I'm gonna start apologizing to all the people I've insulted by telling them, "I'm sorry that you were offended."

Pig: Is that a real apology?

Mouse: No. That's what's so great. It allows me to retain the impact of the original insult while tacking on the implied bonus insult of, "You are an oversensitive ninny."

Pig: But that's kinda rude cause it's sorta saying the guy is too dumb to realize that.

Mouse: I'm sorry that you were offended.

Pig: Apology accepted.

I came across this cartoon at J. Lee Jager's site. It's almost too true to be funny.

How many times have given an apology where you wanted to seem sorry but you really weren't? Just as concerned about preserving your view as you were giving them the impression that you regret hurting them? Ouch.

How many times have you received an apology where the person didn't own any offense? Where the apology really felt like, "I will be careful to handle you more gently next time, because I in my maturity can stoop to your excess sensitivity." Feels lousy, doesn't it?

I'm thinking this is a good measure for whether I have truly forgiven:

What occurs in my heart when I picture walking together alongside them to the foot of the cross?

Fam Fun at the Farm

Last Saturday, before going to Aunt Julie's house to watch the *surprise* Longhorn victory, we stopped by Ekert's Farm just over the border in Illinois. Grand fun! I love*love*love pumpkin season!

For the Love of Autumn

Growth Has a Name

So lately since I'm studying counseling, I'm asking the simultaneous question, "What does the Bible teach about how people grow and change?" It's a question that is key to counseling too, as how you answer it reflects on your philosophy of counseling.

Anyhow, I was studying a word this week. I can be geeky like that. It's the word "tsemach", Hebrew verb for "grow," literally sprout up or spring forth. It's used in a lot of planting metaphors. Here's an example:

Isa 44:3-4
3 For I will pour water on the thirsty land,
and streams on the dry ground;
I will pour out my Spirit on your offspring,
and my blessing on your descendants.
4 They will spring up like grass in a meadow,
like poplar trees by flowing streams.

Is that how you would describe your spiritual growth experience? (Me neither.)

But here's the nugget that encouraged me, the "bring me to Jesus" thought for today.

The noun form of this word is "branch."

Isa 4:2 In that day the Branch of the LORD will be beautiful and glorious,

Jer 23:5-6
"The days are coming," declares the LORD,
"when I will raise up to David a righteous Branch,
a King who will reign wisely
and do what is just and right in the land.
This is the name by which he will be called:
The LORD Our Righteousness.

The "Branch" is a messianic name that speaks of Jesus.

So in the Bible, the concept of growth, tied to this "springing forth" image, we see that growth is not just a nebulous concept.

Growth has a name. Growth is a person. It's Jesus.

Lighter Side of Counseling IV

So how do you and your spouse deal with conflict?
Barbed-wire fence?
Silent avoidance?
Yelling match?
Revenge?
Conflict? What conflict?

Lighter Side of Counseling III

So what do you do with anger?
Spit it out? Tuck it in? Clean the house?

Lighter Side of Counseling II

Yes, let's just say, it took me awhile to get there!