A Message from Wayne C. Allen
A big welcome to those of you that are new to "Into the Centre"!
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Not much to report this week. It's Easter Weekend, and that means Dar gets a
4-day weekend, which is a good thing. Sounds like a rainy weekend, so we'll no
doubt find indoor activities to amuse ourselves.
If you're coming to the Toronto Finding Your Self event, would you please
re-confirm???
Cheers!
Upcoming Workshops
The 2nd instalment of
"Finding Your Self", on May 4,
10 - 6 goes on as scheduled!. Click on the link for a description, costs and directions.
"The
Grid" in Elmira, Sunday June 8, 10 - 6
Click on the link for a description, costs and directions.
Bodywork Practicum in Elmira, on July 4 - 6
Click on the link for a description, costs and directions.
Warmly, Wayne
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The Fringe Dweller's Guide to the Universe
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Universal Rules
# 10. There is no "right" way.
There is just "this way, today."
click
here for the full list of rules
The perils of "right way" thinking seem obvious.
When we hear a story
of some huge blow-up between people, and realize that you have two people locked
in a "rightness" battle that can have no winner, it's one of those, "of course" moments
-- and we get that "right" has nothing to do with it. Often the real
game is, "If you love me you'll do it my way."
The other game in a right/wrong battle is egoic. By this, I mean that the
thing being argued over stands in for the person.
Personalizing the impersonal is quite common. A popular one: having a bad day
because our favourite team lost a game. Sad face, endless discussion of plays,
and, always, "We lost!!!" Well no, "we" didn't lose, unless
perhaps you are actually a player on the team. The people who lost are the
players who actually played the game. That people don't get this and correctly say, "They
lost!!!" speaks volumes.
My favourite therapy tale about the "right way" is one I wrote about in our first
communication booklet. Here is what I wrote, followed by an expansion and
discussion:
I worked with one couple where both spouses worked. She was on a flex shift.
She was expected to look after the kid, make the beds, do the laundry and wipe
out the sink, polishing the faucet to a mirror finish. If she failed at any of
these tasks, there was hell to pay. Especially those faucets.
No amount of reasoning or looking for a compromise would sway Mr. Clean. 4
days of perfection, then a spot on the handle, and out would pop the "evil
twin." He’d criticize, acting superior and all. I gently suggested that
there was no tap in the world worth destroying a relationship over. "Yes
there is! Mine! This is the way I was brought up and this is the way it is and
either she does this little thing for me every day or the relationship is
over!" And so it was.
Now, needless to say, this wasn't the whole story. I spent several sessions
working with this couple, (let's call them Sally and Sam) and found that the husband absolutely refused to let
go of his upbringing. He'd had a stay at home mom who kept the house surgically
clean. He had been looked after and pampered all of his life, and when he got
married he expected his wife to treat him as he expected to be treated. There
were several problems with this.
- Sam wanted Sally to look after him like his mother had. This required
that his every need be met, and especially the unspoken ones.
- Sam wanted Sally to treat him the way Sam saw his mother treat his dad.
Sam wanted to be king of the castle, lord of the manor. When Sam spoke,
Sally was to jump.
- Sam wanted an active and full sex life, with Sally performing on command.
His mother had made it clear that she didn’t like sex all that much, so
Sam assumed Sally did too. In bed, he ordered Sally around, yet never completely enjoyed sex. This, of
course, was Sally's fault.
- The faucets. Mom had always (apparently - this is what Sam told himself)
done the "magic 3" things. The fulfillment of 1 & 2 above were
encapsulated and crystallized in the faucet and sink being spotless.
- Sally was a budding feminist.
I quite liked Sally. She was clearly at her wits end, had tried a couple of
things to resolve the issue, and had persuaded the king of the walk to come to
therapy. Sam, of course, thought the therapy was to "fix" his
"broken" wife. Sam was heavily invested in convincing me of his
benevolent nature – the "all I need Sally to do is this one thing for me.
(The faucets.) Is that so much to ask?"
Well, of course, it wasn't one thing. It was an endless list of
things. Sam saw "broken" everywhere Sam looked. Sam saw his role as
educating and rescuing. If only his poor, pitiful, indecisive and now ungrateful
and angry wife could see that Sam was only doing this for Sally's own good.
And then Sally dared to grow up, expect to be treated as an adult and began
acting out in ways Sam didn't approve of!
Now, it may sound like I'm "blaming" Sam for the problem, and in a
sense I am. I'm not blaming him personally, though. I'm blaming his
approach. Sally was pretty flexible. She tried different approaches.
She reasoned. She made requests for change. In fact, prior to the marriage
ending, she had agreed to simply do the "magic 3" every day. Then, she
had the nerve to get sick and not "do" the taps.
I hadn't liked her giving in to Sam. This approach didn't resolve the
underlying issue. I kept urging Sam to grow up and leave his childish vision of adulthood
behind. Sam was adamant. This was how "all" men were, this was how men
"deserved" to be treated. To Sam dirty taps were disrespectful of him.
They were never simply dirty faucets.
This is why right/wrong discussions are in the main irresolvable.
As soon as either party thinks that there is only one way of seeing or doing things, dialog and creativity are over.
And yet, it is human nature to both normalize our thinking and universalize it
into "truth." So, in a sense, in order to move beyond thinking there
is only one "right way," (and isn't it funny that the right way is
never the other person's way… how interesting…) we have to be willing to let
go of consistency and certainty.
Now, needless to say, that's scary. The stuff we believe in most firmly is
"old, old" stuff. As soon as we mutter or shout, "That's just the
way it is," we know we are stuck in the mouldy past, reliving and
re-stating what we were taught as a child. I know that, when I am overtired, I
revert back to a whiny 6-year-old, who simply wants mommy to show up and make it
all better. I think I also expect that the "make it better" part is
either: a hug, a cookie or a present. I just thought of that, and suspect now I
know why I always have a credit card balance. But I digress.
So, you might look at that and wonder what's wrong with my expectation. Well,
what's wrong with it is several-fold. First, I'm expecting someone else
to come and
rescue me. What this means is that I'm letting myself off of the hook for
resolving my own issues. Second, I expect whoever rescues me to act like my
mother. Third, I'm looking for a bribe to behave, not a resolution of the
issue at hand. I could likely think of more problems with my whiny approach.
If I think that what my 6-year-old wants is "the right way," I am
doomed. If I see it as old information, and therefore one possibility among many, then I allow
myself choice. And notice: I'm not judging the 6-year-old in me to
be bad or wrong. I am judging that acting like a 6-year old is
"wrong," in that it doesn't get me what I really want.
I can't tell you how many people I know that are smart enough to understand
this, yet refuse to change a behaviour that doesn't work. And then I think of
Gandhi, who cancelled a march because of the danger. A reporter said, "How
can you change your mind like that? People are looking forward to the
march." Gandhi replied something to the effect of, "My commitment is
to truth, not consistency."
Gandhi is stating that truth is relative, expanding and changing, all the
time. Truth is "this way, today." Truth is, "Let's try this a
different way and see what happens." Truth is, "I don't have a clue.
Let's look for another way."
This week, look at the stories you tell yourself, about your
"truths." About how the world "should" be. About how others
"ought to be" acting or treating you. Then, have a breath, give
yourself a shake and do what you can. Let go of your rules, and look instead for
another way. "This way, today."
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