1. Being “sharp edged” is more desirable than being “balanced” or “well rounded.” Put yourself out there!
2. Adventure and risk are necessary to foster desired growth. All growth requires some loss!
3. “Safety” (risk avoidance) and the need for consensus (so no one feels left out) can get in the way of discovery and growth. You will never change the world without suffering some loss or without offending someone!
4. Being “nice” can get in the way of being helpful and honest. You can always be loving but you cannot always be nice!
5. A “closed door” sometimes means you have to break the door down. Without persistence you will change nothing!
6. Generosity is evidence of divine intervention. Giving IS better than receiving.
7. Anxiety seldom gives birth to great ideas. You want to accomplish more than mere survival!
8. Great ideas are usually initially dismissed. There is always someone waiting to rain on your parade!
9. Playing “hide and seek” or “ducking and diving” (avoidance) is unproductive and unkind. Facing your detractors will help you more than avoiding them!
10. Every great idea, program, or project has to begin somewhere. Embrace your dream and work on it today!

Going home is a strong human desire. I have seen it so frequently in South Africans living abroad, and I experience it myself. Yes, I long to spend extended hours with old friends at one of Durban’s Indian restaurants, or order tea and scones from Gordon, my favorite waiter in all the world and sit in the sun at the restaurant in Mitchell Gardens.

But circumstances dictate that my visits are vicarious, and so this mornings You and Me takes the form of a personal welcome to some of my favorite friends from where I make my home Indianapolis who will land today in your beautiful city and taste of your excessive hospitality.

Retired businesspersons and spiritual leaders Don and Linda Fledderjohn, their daughter, pediatrician Dr. Erica Fledderjohn-Smith, and toddler granddaughter Beatrice Smith will visit the childhood home of husband, entrepreneur, golfer, and now Hoosier, Nolan Smith (no relation to me) formerly of Beachwood Boys’ High School. I know this fine group will be enriched while visiting family, resting on the beaches, eating in your fine restaurants and spending lots of money!

For the record “Hoosier” is pronounced “HooSSHHier” and is the nickname given to persons who call Indiana home. “Banana Boys” is or was to persons from Kawa-Zulu Natal what Hoosier is to persons from Indiana.

“How can you make someone love you or stay in love? My wife just turned 40 (she looks 30) and I think she thinks she old and I think she has needs for attention. She thinks if she doesn’t get out of our marriage now, she will be too old to attract anyone else.  Any input?”

I’d suggest the harder you try to make someone love you, the more of a controlling person you will become. Because love is a choice there is therefore nothing you can do to force love either into, or out of, someone.

As is often true, your marriage is facing deeper issues than your wife’s need for attention, or her (inevitable) aging!

Things might significantly improve in your marriage if you focused your anxiety elsewhere other than on your apparently high-maintenance wife.

I think you’d be amazed at how much people can grow and be transformed when left to do it.

“I read today’s column (Monday 5th: ‘Family misreads kindness for weakness’) and cheered for the woman who wrote it. Perhaps she should invest in a copy of ‘Boundaries’ by Cloud and Townsend. She has made the first step and said no, but people don’t always take no for an answer. They may use guilt and manipulation to challenge her stand. She will need to constantly remind and reassure herself that she has done, and is doing the right thing. I lent my copy of ‘Boundaries’ to my sister and she keeps it next to her bed. She consults it regularly to remind herself that when she says no, it is her right to do so.”

You are correct. Also, when a person has been unsure of his or her boundaries it is common to be filled with self-doubt once appropriate boundaries are established. Healthy boundaries can feel wrong, selfish, or unkind. Remember, there is some “positive” return for having poor boundaries making a person feel needed, wanted, or important and so, when this “positive“ return ceases (as boundaries are established) the one who newly asserts his or her boundaries can feel abandoned, unwanted, or unimportant, and then even desire to recant on what really is a very necessary and healthy stand. Health demands unrelenting courage and it will always be tested and challenged.

Perhaps it is hardly significant by some standards, but reaching half-a-million hits for this website is significant for me….

My thanks to all who read http://www.DifficultRelationships.com

Rod Smith

“My husband, like many other men, considers Mothers Day to be a commercialized rip-off. He says that I am not his mother and will not acknowledge Mothers Day for me. I feel it would be nice to be acknowledged as the mother of his children . It would be nice if he set a good example to the children and helped them choose a card or very small gift so that they learn to show appreciation for what is done for the mom a daily basis. What I find very hurtful is that  the day before Mothers Day he asks me what I have bought for his mother for Mothers Day even though she is not MY mother. Every Fathers Day I buy him a small gift and a card from myself and the children and wish him because I think it is healthy for the children to learn to say thank you and show appreciation and also I would like to be the bigger person. We have had children for 16 years. Please comment.”

Mother Day may well be a commercialized rip-off. But, your husband could still MAKE something beautiful for you and, in so doing,  teach your children to resist predatory commercialism and express how he treasures the mother of his children! Happy Mothers Day!

“My husband is the best person I have ever known. But slowly over the course of a year and a half, he’s come to the realization that he is not in love with me anymore. He is trying to ‘do the right thing’ and hasn’t left the home but its just like we are friends now…no more lovers. I am so lonely and I feel horrible every time I think about it. I know I could have been better in our marriage. I admitted to my weaknesses and faults and genuinely saw things for the first time in a new light that made me want to change. But its been 8 months and maybe my efforts are too late. We met in high school. We grew up together and were each other’s best friends. But now in his eyes, I’m like an enemy. He needs to ‘find himself’ and he feels like he can’t do that with me.  I never thought in a million years I’d be in this situation. But I still love him and still hope and still pray.”

Avoid blaming yourself.  I hope your husband begins to see his marriage as his only legitimate crucible in which he may truly “find” himself.