July 9, 2009
by Rod Smith
Welcome Tim
President of Growth and Associates, located in Brentwood, California, to Durban today. Tim and I met in Hawaii in 1986 when Tim was a know-it-all 15-year-old striding the university campus where I studied. Tim’s mother worked at the university while Tim strode the campus as if it were his very own creation. Even then he embodied generosity. Quick witted, visionary, Tim always seemed able and willing to develop a means to get what he needed, and a way to get where he wanted to go.
Congratulations, Tim. Not only have you have become the leader, and the teacher of leaders, making all who know you proud, you also offer hope to parents who might be overwhelmed, even intimidated by the zeal, determination, intelligence, and creativity they discern in their offspring.
Author, entrepreneur, and friend, welcome to Durban. I wish I were there to greet you, to haul you off to tea at Mitchell Park with Gordon, my favorite waiter in the world, and then show you Durban’s beauty. I will have to leave that up to those you meet while you are there. Durbanites will show you a good time. It comes as naturally to them as inspiring others does to you.
Posted in Communication, Differentiation, Education, Faith, Friendship, Grace, Leadership, Listening |
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July 3, 2009
by Rod Smith
You can love and NOT worry...
Easy-to-make
fundamental (primordial) errors of belief humans often make in relationships can unsettle (challenge) the strongest of commitments. These “emotional fault-lines” can require intensive understanding on behalf of the one so inflicted, and, when not embraced and accepted by others (I do not mean appeased) these troubled foundations can result in consequential ramifications in day-to-day loving, living, and parenting:
1. Attention equals love and the amount of attention reflects the amount of love. To mistake attention with love and the lack of attention with the lack of love. “If you love me then I will be the focus of much (hopefully all) of your attention,” and,”If you give your attention to someone else it means you love them and not me or you love them more than you love me.”
2. Worry (anxiety) equals love. To think (or feel) that the presence of anxiety or worry or concern is a sign of love and commitment. “If I love you then I must worry about you,” or “If you love me then how can you be so seemingly worry-free about me?” or “When you love someone you think about that person and worry about what they are doing all day, or you don’t love them.”
3. Togetherness, unity, and being “on the same page” are signs of love and commitment. “How can we possibly love each other if we don’t think and feel and see things in as much the same way as possible? There, look at Jack and Jill across the street, they are so in love she even thinks for him, they dress the same, and he calls her 15 times a day at work to let her know he’s concerned about her safety. Now that – that is love.”
Posted in Anger, Anxiety, Attraction, Blended families, Boundaries, Communication, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships, Education, Faith, Family, Forgiveness, Friendship, Grace, Listening, Long distance relationships, Love, Parenting/Children, Past relationships, Re-marriage, Reactivity, Recovery, Therapeutic Process, Triangles, Victims, Violence, Voice |
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July 2, 2009
by Rod Smith
“My three children live with my partner of 9 months and me. His children visit regularly. His son (12) pushes the boundaries and my partner allows him get away with a lot more than the other kids, including his daughter. My partner, who is brilliant with my children, will comment on bad behavior from my children, yet will not judge his son for the same behavior. His son lies to get the other kids into trouble and when I am near his father he makes sure that I cannot get too near. I refuse to compete with a 12-year-old for the affections of his father. My issue is the unfairness. It drives me up the wall. His father feels his son is sensitive and because he sees him so little that he will be less harsh with him. I understand this and am not sure if I am being unfair. I am starting to dislike the boy more and more. Please help.”
Get out of the middle...
Rod:
You are already competing and the boy is winning! Get off the “life is fair” gig and out of the middle. Leave EVERYTHING about his children UP TO HIM. While you are 12-year-old-focused, dad doesn’t have to be, – and you will always, always, end up looking like the enemy!
Kathryn
Kathryn:
Ignoring the behavior is not loving to anyone. The boy’s “sensitivity” is never a good reason for parents not to discipline a child. Consistently setting good boundaries with children is very loving. Spend intentional time together and perhaps your partner’s own guilt may dissipate bringing change into the dynamic. Be honest.
Posted in Attraction, Blended families, Boundaries, Children, Communication, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships, Education, Faith, Family, Friendship, Leadership, Living together, Parenting/Children, Single parenting, Step parenting, Stepfather, Stepmother, Teenagers |
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June 23, 2009
by Rod Smith
“I have been seeing a man for two years. We’re both in our early thirties. I really want to get married but he never talks about. How can I get him to talk about marrying me and about where this relationship is going? We need more communication.”
Rod@TakeUpYourLife.com
1.
“No communication” is impossible. You are missing what is already being said. Couples often think the issue is “more communication” and fail to hear what is already being communicated. He is “telling” you that he has no interest in being married to you.
2.
The passive “partner” runs the relationship. The frustrations you already feel will become life long frustrations if you do marry. If you have to work this hard before you are married do you think being married will be any easier? There’s power in being passive and he’s got it. You’re working this thing as if your life depends on it and he is silent.
3.
The harder you work, the more passive he will become. He has all the power and leverage because, in seeking it, you have given it to him. This is a simple, albeit perverse, law of relationships.
4. He has already decided where this relationship is “going.”
You get to decide if you will go “nowhere” with him.
5. Can it be redeemed? Perhaps.
Start by completely backing off. Emulate his passivity. It might jump-start him into action. Then again, it might not.
Posted in Attraction, Communication, Faith, Family, Triangles, Trust |
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June 20, 2009
by Rod Smith
Pastor, take UP your life!
Enriched is the Pastor who…
1. Has the support, trust, and the encouragement of the congregation even when unpopular decisions become necessary.
2. Doesn’t have to combat or interpret a political minefield within the immediate leadership team and community in order to get meaningful work accomplished.
3. Is sufficiently aware and respectful of the congregation’s history, yet does not allow the history to compromise its future.
4. Is not surrounded by “yes” men and women who, in their inability to appropriately stand up to the pastor, have lost their capacity to think and, as a result of their misplaced loyalties, foster significant disruption in the community. [It’s PEACEMAKERS, not PEACEKEEPERS you want as co-leaders, pastor!]
5. Identifies the inevitable “lunatic fringe” existing in every community and can therefore effectively resist their agendas, ignore and expose their rumors, and be aware of their proclivity to disrupt and damage communities.
6. Is not engulfed by church members who use religious talk, money or threats to implement their will or their understanding of God’s will.
7. Is not too busy to have meaningful daily contact with his family.
8. Knows the most dissatisfied (loud, religiously aggressive, “conspiracy driven”) people in the congregation are usually those who are already unhappy at home and who are already difficult to live with.
9. Does not sacrifice his family or personal life for the sake of the congregation, knowing that success at home and church are inextricably connected.
10. Knows that self-care, self-preservation, self-awareness, are essential, in fact crucial to his or her leadership of a community, and that self-care, self-preservation, and self-awareness are the very antithesis of selfishness despite the chorus (in fact, it is usually the most “needy” members of the choir!) of persons who will try to dissuade him or her otherwise.
11. Knows that the essence of “giving up his or her life” or “laying down his or her life” for the sake of Jesus and the Gospel requires incredible self-knowledge, self-awareness, and self-preservation, in order that he or she may honestly, and with full integrity, make a meaningful gift of self to the service of God and God’s Kingdom.
12. Knows that it is as important for him/her to stay grounded in reading Scripture as it is for him or her to be able to see when he/she is being TRIANGLE-D, and of course, how to get out of it.
13. Knows that so-called “burn out” is not a product of hard work but a product of getting him/herself in the middle of other people’s unresolved problems and issues (or, to be perhaps blunt, to NOT mind his/her own business!)
14. Knows that morality and integrity are about understanding his or her BOUNDARIES and NOT about his or her KNOWLEDGE, or training, success, or the size of the congregation.
15. Understands the fallacy of empathy as a helpful or useful means to growing his/her team for a strong future.
Posted in Boundaries, Communication, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships, Education, Faith, Family, High maintenance relationships |
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June 3, 2009
by Rod Smith
Let's talk
(a non-sexual inordinate attachment with someone other than the spouse) will be very tough on a committed spouse. If this affair is full-blown you will probably feel as if you are living with someone who is absent in every manner but physically. He or she would really rather be elsewhere.
Calling attention to this hurtful inordinate attachment will probably result in flaring tempers and/or in further distancing which are designed to silence you. Consequently you will find yourself watching every word you say lest every encounter results in a flare up and/or in your spouse walking out the door.
Suggestions:
1. “Steel” yourself. Remind yourself that you are strong, deserving of the very best in all your relationships, that you are unwilling to tolerate “sharing” your spouse. This is a reasonable position to hold.
2. Do not keep it a secret. Draw attention to the emotional affair even if it disrupts the peace in your home.
3. Be prepared to take radical stands. Be willing to ask your spouse to move out and do not cooperate with the affair any more than you would were it fully sexual in nature. That the affair is non-sexual does not make it acceptable.
Posted in Affairs, Anger, Attraction, Betrayal, Boundaries, Communication, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships, Divorce, Faith, Family, Friendship, Grief, High maintenance relationships, Living together, Long distance relationships, Love, Manipulation, Past relationships, Re-marriage, Reactivity, Recovery, Schnarch, Sex matters, Sexual compatibility, Therapeutic Process, Triangles |
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April 11, 2009
by Rod Smith
Thanks for visiting
Through the wonders of technology I am able to access the key words that land readers on this website. I think you’d be surprised at the frequency of combination of the words “how to hurt a man” appear to be the essence of a search. In response, to those who appear to want to inflict damage, I have devised a list of how to participate in the healing of men and women who have been hurt.
1. Be willing to listen, even if what is being said is what you’d prefer to not hear. Try not to re-engineer (re-frame, recast) what you have heard so it is more fitting with what you’d really like to hear.
2. Resist understandable attempts to short-circuit growth by trying to ease necessary pain, by offering false affirmations, and by accepting empty excuses for irresponsible behavior. Pain is a very good motivator for change. Resist the urge to remove it when it appears to be helpful.
3. Offer your presence, not your answers. “I am with you” is more helpful than “let me help you fix it.”
4. Welcome silence. There are ways to talk that do not include words. Resist the understandable urge to chase healing and learning away with the incessant use of words.
5. Avoid minimizing (“it’s not so bad!”) or rationalizing (“What else did you expect?”) or normalizing (“Anyone would have done that!”) the issues that resulted in pain. Do not rob necessary pain of its usefulness.
6. Promote “future thinking.” Ask questions focused on future wellness and success.
7. Try to avoid searching for the genesis (the cause) of what has led to pain. Where something comes from is not nearly as important living your way out of it.
Write to me: Rod@DifficultRelationships.com / if you want to talk, let me know. I will make time for you.
Posted in Boundaries, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships, Faith, High maintenance relationships |
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April 6, 2009
by Rod Smith
Infidelity is hard to forgive. Not forgiving it is harder. One is a severe punch. The other is a double whammy, its impact potentially outlasting the memory of the betrayal.
Unwillingness to forgive is often the only thing onto which a slighted spouse can hold, the only available ammunition to make a spouse pay. It’s easy to understand. Logical. It’s predictable. But, it ferries undesirable consequences.
Resentment might feel like a good and effective tool to hurt a partner for misdeeds, but it will make you most unattractive. Bitterness might be the most prevalent and obvious
emotion to feel, to use, but it will persistently eat you from the inside, leave you feeling even angrier, even more powerless over your life. Then, apart from punishing your spouse, they (resentment and bitterness) will punish you and contaminate all your relationships. In short, they have no boundaries and they are on a mission to deface all that is good and pure.
Who, from any arena of your life, wants to engage a bitter and resentful person in anything meaningful? His or her infidelity might make a spouse untrustworthy, but your resentment and bitterness will ultimately make you most unattractive!
A partner’s infidelity may rob you of trust, rob you of the sacredness of what you had in marriage, but given time, given time to hurt and to express feelings of appropriate anger, I suggest you relinquish your legitimate right to be angry, and forgive.
This is the high road. And your inner beauty will be strengthened, your light will once again begin to shine. And, your unfaithful spouse will no longer be in control of you or your future whether you remain married or not.
Posted in Affairs, Anger, Attraction, Betrayal, Boundaries, Communication, Difficult Relationships, Faith, Family, Forgiveness, Grief, High maintenance relationships, Living together, Marriage, Re-marriage, Reactivity, Recovery |
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January 25, 2009
by Rod Smith
Order through link on the right
Let go of what is not yours. Hold what is yours with open hands. Sever yourself from electronic devices and your Internet connection for several hours, even days, each week. Go for a long walk. Read
To Kill a Mockingbird even if you studied it at school. Be unpredictable. Risk more. Seek adventure above safety or balance. Give. Climb
down the corporate ladder. Forgive those who hurt you. Give up being right. Affirm others. Thank others. Read
Cry, The Beloved Country.
Listen. Talk less. Learn, and use, people’s names. Watch the movies
Bruce Almighty, Shirley Valentine, Babette’s Feast, and
Billy Elliot. Forgive. Hand-write, and mail, thank you cards. Read the “Sermon on the Mount” no matter what your core religious beliefs.
Stop victim thinking or behaving like one. Blaming the past, others, or negative circumstances, for your current situation, even with cause, is seldom productive.
Relinquish the idea of having the power to change those whom you love. Open the way for others to succeed. Stand in the gap for friends.
Become outrageously generous. By all means,
get out of yourself, and you will find, somewhat ironically, that you will be a lot more comfortable with yourself and “things” really will, – improve.
Posted in Blended families, Boundaries, Faith, Family, Leadership, Love |
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December 22, 2008
by Rod Smith
“As I write my girlfriend is on holiday with her two daughters and her ex-husband. She planned the trip to be with just the girls and when they went to pick up something from his house he was already packed and asked to leave with them. Not wanting to cause a fight in front of the girls, she said it was fine, and they left together. They are away now. She tells me she has no feelings for him and she wishes I were there instead. She wants to have a good relationship with the ex for the sake of the girls. I will pray to God and let Him guide me as He always has. If she is truthful, then everything is fine. In my gut, I know that boundaries take time to establish themselves. I have been trying to take my mom’s advice, “Get to know her, focus on yourself.” I feel at peace. We are neither married, nor engaged. We can change our minds at anytime. If I find that she has lied, or is untrustworthy in anyway, I will move on, having conducted myself in a kind, and unselfish way.”
I love your mother’s advice. Such thinking will save you a lot of pain and avert a lot of damaging anger.
Posted in Affairs, Anger, Attraction, Blended families, Boundaries, Children, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships, Faith, Family, High maintenance relationships |
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