"No one changes the world or makes an impact by isolating themselves behind socially acceptable apathy and fear of risk ... Saving lives, or marriages, or communities is not about using the correct 'procedure' ... it's about really truly putting your essence into what you do. It's about love - in the greatest sense of the word."
-- Penny 2005
Where Are Your Eyes?
My mom is a professional musician. I grew up surrounded by the
classics and by a variety of music that was popular in the 50's - the
time when my mom was a teenager and young adult. We played musical
games at the dinner table, name that tune and name that rhythm. For
as long as I can remember she sang to us and once we could sing along
she would harmonize with our renditions of the melody. So, when I was
thinking about what I wanted to write for today's Musing a song from
my childhood memories immediately began to play in my head.
"All together now - one, two, three,
Keep your mind on your driving,
Keep your hands on the wheel,
Keep your snoopy eyes on the road ahead"
(Paul Evens and The Curls – Sittin in the Backseat 1959)
And that's what I want to talk about – where are your eyes and your
energy focused? When our marriages are struggling and we're working
hard to learn new skills it's so easy to get caught up in what has
gone before. We obsess about and rehash the months and years and all
the past transgressions of our spouse. And we base our current
actions on our memories of the past. Which in turn feeds the
likelihood of the outcome in the present isn't going to look a whole
lot different than the very past we are trying to escape.
But here is something that I'd like you to tattoo on your left hand,
post on your refrigerator or write in lipstick on your bathroom
mirror:
If your marriage is unhappy in the present it is not because of what
has happened in the past, it is because of the choices you are making
today.
I can't change the past, and unless you have a time machine hidden in
your basement, neither can you. All the talking and rehashing will
not make the painful events of the past any less so. And although we
can intellectually recognize that those things happened long ago,
when we talk about them in the present the feelings they evoke are
very real and very much in the present. So that puts us in the
untenable position of feeling painful emotions about something which
cannot be changed.
If our thoughts are focused on the idea that our marriage is
terrible, because it has been so in the past (or in the past week)
then that is what will take on larger than life proportions in our
reality. I'm not suggesting that you pretend that everything is rosy
and ignore the difficult issues that need to be addressed. I am
suggesting that remaining in the present and addressing conflicts
based on what is happening right now is the first step in crafting a
fulfilling and satisfying future.
I can hear you saying – "But our sex life/finances/in-laws/careers
have been a problem for years they're not just in the present." I'm
not arguing with that statement. I'm suggesting that if your sex life
or finances or issues with family or career or anything else is not
working for you it's because you are making choices RIGHT NOW that
are not in the best interest of you, your spouse and your marriage.
We can't change the poor choices and hurt feelings of the past; we
can change direction in the present and build a brighter future.
Keep Your Eyes on the Road Ahead,
Penny
"For better or worse, in sickness and in health, for richer or
poorer, til death us do part."
Most of us said something very like that when we took our wedding
vows. And most of us took those vows in front of family, friends, and
a representative of our God in our faith community. And not only did
we say those things in that manner, but we spent an awful lot of
time, effort, and money getting to the moment when we did so.
A wedding is a lot of beautiful ritual and tradition – not to mention
yards of lace and tulle, bushels of flowers, and layers of cakes –
with one thing being the defining center which ties it all together.
The vows. Those few words about sickness and health, better or worse.
So I'm wondering. Did you mean it?
When all was said and done, the dress bought, the cake baked, the tux
fitted and the DJ hired – did you mean it? The part about sickness
and health, better or worse? How about the richer or poorer part?
Every week at least one client, and usually several more than that,
tells me that they just can't do it anymore, that they have to file
for divorce. It could be that they've discovered their spouse is
addicted to drugs or gambling. It might be that he or she is
oblivious to my client's needs in the marriage. And, because I
specialize in infidelity it is often because the spouse is having an
affair and the pain is tearing the heart out of my client, the
person they once vowed to love and honor and cherish, forsaking all
others.
Whatever the cause of the pain, it is very real and very heart
wrenching. This is when the chips are down and we see what it is we
are made of. Hardship is no joke and our natural instinct as humans
is to survive – to remove ourselves from the pain and the threat it
makes to our happiness and security. Run! Get out! Save yourself! Our
emotions and our instincts give us a hearty push and our friends and
family are not far behind.
If being married was easy, there would be no reason for taking vows.
Vows are something we take in order to show our commitment to some
aspect of life that is difficult to perform or carry out. Vows are
promises that show our determination to go against the flow when it
seems going with the flow is the only option available. Remaining
true to our vows in the face of pain and tragedy is what makes us
fully responsible adults in a world that lauds irresponsibility.
Staying faithful to promises we made forges the steel in our souls.
"But she isn't honoring her promises." "He never treated me with
honor and now he's living with someone else." "I have a right to end
this marriage because of what he has done to me." Funny thing about
the promises we make at weddings – they really aren't about what the
other person does or does not do. Our wedding vows are all about us
and our commitment to the marriage. A commitment that is explicitly
stated to be not only in times of joy and laughter but in the deepest
darkest moments of our lives. A commitment to stick it out come hell
or high water regardless of the pain and suffering. Til death us do
part.
I also know that there comes a time when we need to concede defeat.
When the courts and the legal system cannot be fought or when it
truly happens that the marriage cannot be saved. But these are
decisions that should me made in the cold light of rationality after
every option has been tried and has failed. And I would say that
includes at least a year of separation and no contact before coming
to that decision.
I know that many of you are suffering and fighting against seemingly
insurmountable odds in your marriage right now. It seems that the
easy and perhaps only way out is to end the marriage. It seems
incredibly unfair to watch the days and the months go by wondering
when you will have a life again. It is for moments such as these that
you spoke those words and sealed your promise of commitment in front
of witnesses. So I just have to ask one more time, did you mean it?
All the best,
Penny
At least once a day, and often many more times than that someone
says to me, "People don't change." Sometimes I hear it from a worn
out and hurting spouse who has given up on their own marriage. More
I often I hear it second hand – someone is advising someone else to
ditch their marriage and making that statement as if it were cast in
stone. Many times it is a straying spouse justifying to themselves
and to the world their choice to abandon their vows in favor of
someone outside the marriage -- "My husband/wife was so terrible to
live with and I know he/she will never change -- I'm only pursuing
my own happiness."
So, what I want to know is who on earth came up with this statement
that `people don't change,' and what special power do they have that
allowed them to convince what seems to be an entire society of
something that is so obviously not true? Obvious to the point of
being ridiculous – like saying the sun will not rise day in and day
out when we can all see quite clearly that it does.
Everyone changes. And every one of us experiences profound life
altering changes. Or perhaps I should say life altering events from
which we cannot help but to emerge changed.
A parent dies
A child in born
A child is born with significant challenges
We go to college/get our first job/buy a home
We get fired from a job
We lose all our money
We win the lottery
We move from the place we have called home all our lives
We get a dog
Our children go to school/grow up/leave home
We recover memories of abuse in our past
We learn that we are adopted
We find out a parent had an affair many years ago
Parents age
We age
We find unexpectedly that we have some disease
Our child has a drug problem
Our child is gifted
Fire/flood/storm destroys our home
We discover a spouse's infidelity
We are unfaithful
The list could go on for pages. Forever. For several years, long
ago, I worked as an EMT in a small rural community. I saw heart
attacks, accidents, deaths, children born beautifully whole who
became profoundly ill, strokes, and suicides. Week after week the
thought would hit me that all of us go about our daily lives doing
what we do, and then, between one breath and the next, that life is
changed forever.
I also saw extraordinary courage. People who did what they had to
do, in the face of difficulty and pain, because it was there and it
needed to be done. Men and women who looked inside themselves, saw
only fear, and yet who behaved with courage that was inspiring. They
changed as their lives changed. We all do, from the time we are born
until the day we leave this life.
So when someone says to me that `people don't change' I have to
struggle to keep from snorting and rolling my eyes and asking who on
earth convinced them of something so obviously untrue (Which only
goes to show that having learned not to do that I CAN change my
instinct to be disrespectful). Look around!!! I say, change is
everywhere all the time and every person you know has been forced by
life to change over and over again.
People do change. As humans we are incapable of not changing. The
real question is what will it take to choose to change rather than
simply being forced to by the circumstances life tosses at us. What
will it take to claim our own empowerment and direct the course of
our lives?
Most importantly, the truth I tell husbands and wives every day is
this – If you want your marriage to change, you need to change.
There is an indescribable spiraling of energy in a marriage – for
real change to occur within the relationship both partners need to
make very primal changes. And yet, the responsibility for that
change lies one hundred percent with each individual.
I wonder if when someone says, "People don't change," what they are
really saying is, "I don't like where I am and I don't want to do
the hard work of change." It is much less frightening to push the
blame for a hurting relationship onto our mate's shoulders than it
is to face our own internal labyrinth.
All the best,
Penny
My husband, Steve, and I bought our home here in Wisconsin almost
exactly four and a half years ago. After nearly two years of looking
in five different states and insisting that we did not want or have
time for a `project' we excitedly bought a house that needed just
about every type of work imaginable. To give you an idea of the
extent of our new project , our house came with no kitchen
(there was an empty white box of a room designated as such but that
was it) and none of the four bathrooms was fully functional. That
was the tip of the iceberg.
Now being the pragmatic realists that we are we
not only began to tackle the kitchen and the bathrooms and the other
necessary tasks but we took on some purely aesthetic changes as
well. I want to tell you about one of those and how it relates to
this idea of marriage and pain and all those things. (And, in case
you did not get this at the time I wrote the Popcorn piece – I can
make just about anything into a piece about marriage.)
Once Upon A Time there was a Stairway. A functional and perfectly
sound Stairway that had only the flaw of Incredible Ugliness.
(Really, I'm not making that up – it was uuuuggggly) This Stairway
lived in the heart of our home going from our family room on the
lowest level to the living room on the main level and then
continuing in all its Ugly Glory up to the game room in the loft.
The Stairway was so Ugly that it turned our eyes from the projects
that needed to be done and sang a Siren Song of ripping and tearing
and dreaming. We were here less than a month when we saw The
Picture. A big beautiful glossy full color Picture of a stunning
spiral staircase. It called our names and pulled us from the warmth
of our bed in the wee hours of the night. We raced to the site of
the Ugliness, our eyes glazed over as we envisioned what It Could
Be. Spiral, winding its way sinuously up through three levels.
Beautiful.
Like all dreams of turning Ugliness into Beauty the Stairway
Project, as it came to be known, took far more effort than we could
ever have dreamed. It required at least a year and a half of
planning just the structural support that would be needed. During
that time we were consumed with researching the various spiral
staircase manufacturers and comparing each and every aspect of their
wares.
Before we could begin to create the new we needed to tear out and
remove the old. It was two more years of hard labor on everything
but the Stairway itself. Our loft became inaccessible for nearly two
years as the Old Stairway found its way in pieces onto the Funeral
Pyre of our bonfire pit. Three levels of flooring needed to be
pulled out, disposed of and then replaced. Two levels of ceiling
needed to be installed and finished. Two levels of walls needed new
sheetrock, mud and paint. One window and three structural wall
supports had to be added. And along the way were various Adventures
such as the Great Fall which pulled us off course and reminded us
that control is an illusion.
When all the prep work was done, the tiles laid, the wood floor
sealed, the balusters installed and finished at last the stair
treads themselves snaked up the center pole. After more than four
years of dreams and nightmares it all seemed rather anti-climactic.
They took less than a day to attach. Finally, on this New Year's Day
in the year 2004 of the Common Era I put the final coat of finish
and we held the official Ribbon Cutting on Jan 2.
It was only in the final week that all the years of effort came to a
cohesive whole. More than 1600 days of destruction and mess and dust
and disarray and then all at once it became a Thing of Beauty.
So what does this tale have to do with marriage? When couples come
to me with accounts of pain and neglect and incompatibility they are
like the Stairway Project. So much that needs to be done before it
will all come together. And so often, like the ripping and tearing
and dust making that we did, the steps (ha! No pun intended!) which
move a marriage from ugly and painful to beautiful and gracious seem
to be taking us away from that goal. The tasks and the building that
need to be done seem incredibly overwhelming and the work seems to
be constant without any sign of progress. And it is painful – messy
and painful. And it looks much worse before it begins to look better.
It is only when we get to the .end of the rebuilding process that we
see it all fall together in a way that appears effortless. When the
support has been laid and the decisions that lead to a mutually
wonderful lifestyle have been worked through – often with dust and
debris! – suddenly out of what seems like nowhere a marriage that is
beautiful and gracious emerges.
I am blessed to be part of the process in others' lives. It
takes courage and vision – and that is something each of us has
built into our humanness. Harness yours and see what beautiful
spirals you can create.
Keep Climbing,
Penny
My husband, Steve, and I bought our home here in Wisconsin almost
exactly four and a half years ago. After nearly two years of looking
in five different states and insisting that we did not want or have
time for a `project' we excitedly bought a house that needed just
about every type of work imaginable. To give you an idea of the
extent of our new project , our house came with no kitchen
(there was an empty white box of a room designated as such but that
was it) and none of the four bathrooms was fully functional. That
was the tip of the iceberg.
Now being the pragmatic realists that we are we
not only began to tackle the kitchen and the bathrooms and the other
necessary tasks but we took on some purely aesthetic changes as
well. I want to tell you about one of those and how it relates to
this idea of marriage and pain and all those things. (And, in case
you did not get this at the time I wrote the Popcorn piece – I can
make just about anything into a piece about marriage.)
Once Upon A Time there was a Stairway. A functional and perfectly
sound Stairway that had only the flaw of Incredible Ugliness.
(Really, I'm not making that up – it was uuuuggggly) This Stairway
lived in the heart of our home going from our family room on the
lowest level to the living room on the main level and then
continuing in all its Ugly Glory up to the game room in the loft.
The Stairway was so Ugly that it turned our eyes from the projects
that needed to be done and sang a Siren Song of ripping and tearing
and dreaming. We were here less than a month when we saw The
Picture. A big beautiful glossy full color Picture of a stunning
spiral staircase. It called our names and pulled us from the warmth
of our bed in the wee hours of the night. We raced to the site of
the Ugliness, our eyes glazed over as we envisioned what It Could
Be. Spiral, winding its way sinuously up through three levels.
Beautiful.
Like all dreams of turning Ugliness into Beauty the Stairway
Project, as it came to be known, took far more effort than we could
ever have dreamed. It required at least a year and a half of
planning just the structural support that would be needed. During
that time we were consumed with researching the various spiral
staircase manufacturers and comparing each and every aspect of their
wares.
Before we could begin to create the new we needed to tear out and
remove the old. It was two more years of hard labor on everything
but the Stairway itself. Our loft became inaccessible for nearly two
years as the Old Stairway found its way in pieces onto the Funeral
Pyre of our bonfire pit. Three levels of flooring needed to be
pulled out, disposed of and then replaced. Two levels of ceiling
needed to be installed and finished. Two levels of walls needed new
sheetrock, mud and paint. One window and three structural wall
supports had to be added. And along the way were various Adventures
such as the Great Fall which pulled us off course and reminded us
that control is an illusion.
When all the prep work was done, the tiles laid, the wood floor
sealed, the balusters installed and finished at last the stair
treads themselves snaked up the center pole. After more than four
years of dreams and nightmares it all seemed rather anti-climactic.
They took less than a day to attach. Finally, on this New Year's Day
in the year 2004 of the Common Era I put the final coat of finish
and we held the official Ribbon Cutting on Jan 2.
It was only in the final week that all the years of effort came to a
cohesive whole. More than 1600 days of destruction and mess and dust
and disarray and then all at once it became a Thing of Beauty.
So what does this tale have to do with marriage? When couples come
to me with accounts of pain and neglect and incompatibility they are
like the Stairway Project. So much that needs to be done before it
will all come together. And so often, like the ripping and tearing
and dust making that we did, the steps (ha! No pun intended!) which
move a marriage from ugly and painful to beautiful and gracious seem
to be taking us away from that goal. The tasks and the building that
need to be done seem incredibly overwhelming and the work seems to
be constant without any sign of progress. And it is painful – messy
and painful. And it looks much worse before it begins to look better.
It is only when we get to the .end of the rebuilding process that we
see it all fall together in a way that appears effortless. When the
support has been laid and the decisions that lead to a mutually
wonderful lifestyle have been worked through – often with dust and
debris! – suddenly out of what seems like nowhere a marriage that is
beautiful and gracious emerges.
I am blessed to be part of the process in others' lives. It
takes courage and vision – and that is something each of us has
built into our humanness. Harness yours and see what beautiful
spirals you can create.
Keep Climbing,
Penny
I attended a coaching intensive this summer led by Dave Buck, one of
the leaders in the coaching industry. He talked about the difference
between a good coach, a proficient coach and a masterful coach. His
assertion was that a good coach listens to the client, looks for
problems or issues that are familiar and then helps the client
`fix' those things. A proficient coach can looks for problems and
issues throughout the conversation with the client and helps to work
through those things – even if it is something new and unfamiliar
to the coach. A masterful coach CREATES problems.
A masterful coach understands that real personal growth comes from
rocking the boat which can be a less than pleasant experience –
at least at the outset.
And that is where the idea of feeling the pain comes in. For those
of us who work in the marriage healing industry our long term goal
is to craft a marriage that is happy and fulfilling to both husband
and wife. So it seems counter-productive to go to a place of more
pain. And yet, I find that is exactly what happens. My experience
has been that the changes couples must make in order to heal their
marriages make it virtually unavoidable that things will look and
feel a whole lot worse before they begin to be better.
When marriages are hurting often the people involved hide that hurt
behind anger and disrespect. Focusing energy on how terrible the
other person is allows us not to feel the very real and very deep
pain that we carry inside. When we stop those angry and
disrespectful behaviors we are often overwhelmed with the intensity
of the hurt. Our first instinct is to find some way to not feel it.
Bury ourselves in our work, our kids, our homes or even in the
recovery and healing of our marriages. None of those are
intrinsically poor choices, but I believe that real internal shifts
take place in the fecundity of grief.
In grieving the past, and the loss of the dream, we have the chance
to really examine our own role in that loss and to dig deep for the
courage to change ourselves. Part of the pain that we must
experience and the grieving that needs to be done is for the loss of
our own innocence. When we can grieve our own culpability we can
begin to take the steps towards shifting our attitudes and behaviors.
Feeling the pain is not the same as wallowing. It's not about
choosing to be miserable. In fact it is the antithesis of that.
Feeling the pain is about facing head on the death of the marriage
you thought you had or were going to have. And from that pain
finding the strength to do what you need to do to create a better
vision for the future.
As a coach it is tempting to move couples towards light and easy. It
is painful for me to see the pain of others. Growing into being a
masterful coach means sitting peacefully with those in pain and
guiding them gently through the process of loss towards the light at
the end of the tunnel.
If you are hurting today, my heart is with you. I hope that you see
that you have the wisdom and the courage to go through the pain and
reach the other side where healing can begin for real.
All the best,
Penny
