Winners and Losers? Or. . .

As I reflect on the Bronco's game yesterday, and March Madness last spring, and the rivalry between Apple and Microsoft, and neighbors who don't get along and neighbors who do get along, I question the essential value of "win-lose" in relationships.  Actually, I question it in many areas of life.

I saw a Broncos team member and an Eagles team member exchange a friendly pat on the back before getting their heads back into the game.  At that point, win-lose was just the game -- relationally they were about win-win, and it felt good.

How many husbands and wives, I wonder, compete with one another.  If they do, mostly it's subtle.  Subtle or not, it destroys the intimacy and hope of their relationship.  He makes so much money.  She must make as much or a bit more.  He has so many friends.  She must have a few more friends.  She spends time with the kids.  He must be more important to the kids than she is.

You get the idea.

In relationships, open and friendly competition may be fun.  A win-lose approach to the relationship leads to disaster, even if only one party embraces it.

What do you think?

Leave a comment and let us know.

Guilt, Shame and Living, Part Two

Shame rules most of the world.  Not guilt.  Not the absence of guilt.  Shame.

Even here in the United States children often hear, "You ought to be ashamed of yourself."  Shame is used to goad, prod, punish, immolate and destroy.  Probably because the upper classes in England did so much to destroy and damage each other and the classes 'below' them, we Americans have done a lot to abandon motivation by shame.

Sadly, we still have shame.  We have few ways of helping people move past it.

In some cultures they have rituals for dealing with shame.  A year wearing black, perhaps.  Saying, "I'm sorry."  Laying prostrate at the door of the person you besmirched, or the door of a temple, or in front of a ruler are some means of ritually cleansing oneself of the stigma of shame.  When I was first exploring this I learned that one Asian country had 28 formal methods for dealing with shame.  I thought we Americans had no such rituals.

I was wrong.  My friend, Ted, noted:  "We move away."

Americans change locations, take jobs across the country, go to the big city, or leave to live in a secluded retreat.  But we cannot all do that.

The wild West is pretty much settled.  Where will you go when you are deeply shamed, or ashamed?

Just knowing the difference between shame and guilt could help a person deal with whichever is crushing her or him.  It could help us rebuild relationships, including the relationship to one's self.

What do you think?  Leave a comment and let us know.

Guilt, Shame and Living

Many years ago I learned an important distinction.  I learned that we often confuse two quite different experiences.  We confuse guilt with shame, and shame with guilt.  They feel like first cousins, if not identical, when we are hurting.  Making the distinction, however, permits us to deal with each of them with some success.

In one sense, guilt is the easy one.  We are guilty when we break a rule, social convention, law, or commandment.  This is a legal concept.  There are two choices:  guilty or not guilty.  Shading comes in the statement of the crime, not whether one is guilty or not guilty.  Simple, really.  It might be murder, second-degree murder, or killing in service of one's government.  Did you?  Did you not?  Guilty?  or, not guilty?

There is an antidote for guilt.  A solution, really.

A person can never be un-guilty, but he or she can be. . . forgiven.

Forgiven by the person I hurt, or his surviving family.  Forgiven by society.  And, hardest of all, forgiven by one's self.

In our law-oriented society we are basically about determining guilt.  Less so, we work with forgiveness.  Resources are in place to help us.

Guilty?  Not Guilty?  What do you think?  Leave a comment and let us know.

"I Want To Fit In!"

I have been acquainted with many people who want to fit in.  Pop psychologists make diagnoses -- abandonment issues, a parent liked someone else in the family more than this person, they were bullied as a child, . . . The list goes on and on.  Bottom line, however, is that my acquaintances want to belong so intensely each would give up his/her authentic self in order to fit in.

At some level, of course, we each need to fit in.  We need to fit in to the department where we work, to the church where we worship, to the class we are taking.  Some of our rough edges need polishing off.  You understand that, and so do I.

I believe, however, that our relationships deteriorate badly when we try to hard to fit in that we give up more than the rough edges.  We give up that authentic inner being.  We commit relational suicide in the name of having just the relationships we lust after.

The shy person keeps going to parties to please the person she thinks she needs to please.  The competent guy chooses to make mistakes in order to fit in with the less competent he believe he needs to be part of.  It works. . . for awhile.

Something of a person's phoniness begins showing through, however.  People begin whispering, "I really don't like being around ______.  Something is just nor right."

The inner disconnect between the deepest values and beliefs of a person and the veneer of behavior she or he has adopted begins to chafe.  Her or his relationship with the herself or himself causes pain, or a sense of deadness, or even resentment of the people once chosen as the "adopted family".

Let me quickly add one footnote:  I am not speaking of appropriate changes each of us must make to grow into our best selves.  The complaining habits can be broken, the judgmental attitudes can be toned down, the chronic sarcasm can be modified.  It is best done by attending to the insecurities and pain within and mending from the inside out.  The motivation is to be the better person, however, not to fit in with this "better" crowd, clique or club.

I received this quote from Thoughtful Mind:      “Don't change so people will like you. Be yourself & the right people will love the real you.” 

What do you think?  Leave a comment and let us know.

Internal Verbal Abuse -- Not Acceptable

Jill Bolte Taylor, "My Stroke of Insight", p. 161, wrote:

"I'm a devout believer that paying attention to our self-talk is vitally important for our mental health.  In my opinion, making the decision that internal verbal abuse is not acceptable behavior is the first step toward finding deep inner peace.  It has been extremely empowering for me to realize that the negative storyteller portion of my brain is only about the size of a peanut!"  

When any person get abuse heaped upon the self, that person tends to change.  

• . . . from  loving to hating
• . . . from sweet to bitter
• . . . from accepting to rejecting
• . . . from at peace to in conflict
• . . . from healthy to unhealthy

When the person I trust most (me) heaps verbal abuse on my self, I really set myself up for failure in relationships, business, sports, music -- whatever it is that I hope to be successful at.

Oh, wait.  I accepted the abuse so much I no longer expect to succeed at much of anything.  

My friend, Virginia Tozer once remarked that she hated the phrase, "such a worm as I" in a well known hymn.  "I am not a worm!" she explained.  

She was correct.  

If you find yourself abusing yourself verbally, seek help and stop.  In a few months you will either be a different person, with better relationships, or you will (if you dare look) be very defensive about how you deserve the abuse.  

What do you think?  Leave a comment and let us know.