Intermission - 2. A milestone in life

I'll be slowing down with my postings for a little while, to maybe 1 per week. Obligations and all that.

Meanwhile......

There is a milestone in life, the one I’m going to talk about now, which is probably the most significant one in your life.

Be under no illusion, ‘significant’ is not all good!

There is a price to pay. The rewards, however, can exceed all expectations.

First, sorry folks, a little science – though in plain English so you don’t need a PhD.


From the very first millisecond our conscious mind clicks into awareness, we become inundated with input, a total overload, and we begin developing mechanisms to help us cope.

The way we learn to see gives a useful example of such a mechanism.

We have specialist cells at the back of our eyes (millions of them), and they react to light – sending signals to our brain.(For the interested - ‘Rods’ detect black and white, ‘cones’ detect colour.)

However, if a light shines on them for too long, they temporarily burn out – which is a ‘bad thing’.

We are not aware of it, but our eyes are constantly vibrating, moving those cells in and out of a specific light wave to protect them. (A simplification here, sorry).

An example of burn out is that glowing ball of light we can still see with eyes shut after staring at the sun. It is a negative image of the sun we stared at, as only the non-burnt out cells are temporarily working (the burnt out ones do kick back into life after a while).

The key point being that we never, ever, see anything clearly, just a cloud of light and dark and colour.

During the early years, we begin interpreting those clouds, using our other senses in the process. E.g. Touch a hard edge of a table, learn to associate that particular cloud with the hard edge of a table. We eventually teach ourselves to ‘see’, to compensate for those vibrating eyes.

Busy bees we become eh.

Too busy when you add in the same ‘associations’ we are building with all of our senses.


To avoid that potential overload, into the frame comes ‘categorisation’.

We continue experiencing a sensation (or sight) until we get just enough information to categorise it, then we stop. Most of the time, we are approximately correct, but illusion occurs when we get it wrong.

Try something. When you are about to see a friend or loved one after a while apart – picture them in your mind. When you meet, truly stare at them - concentrate, compare what you actually see with that memory you recalled. You will spot a hell of a lot of differences. Categorisation stopped you updating the image, and quite a while ago!

Ever wondered why you stop noticing that you are wearing a watch or a ring etc? The signals are still being sent by your nerves, but the brain switches off reception – category identified, signal not required. We filter out the majority of the signals our bodies (including eyes) are sending us, categorised, they are ‘not needed’.

We do the same with our thinking!

We learn to love shoving things into categories and hence not having to think too much more about them. We filter out a lot of thinking.

Here comes the bad news. A mechanism that worked wonders for learning to see with our eyes actually fails miserably when it comes to thinking.

That milestone, one that only a few ever reach, comes from understanding how categorisation is failing us.

We start to resist it.

However, we also then move out of those comfort zones.

The rewards can be immense, but it can also be painful and lonely at times.

Relationships - Part 4b

In part 4a, I gave a simple example of the reality check - comparing a partner’s words with their actions. As painful and difficult as that might be, life would still be far simpler if that was all we had to do.

Life tends to play more devious games with us however and, whether dealing with a relationship or with a solo life, the personal reality check is essential. I will briefly cover that now, hopefully you will get the message by reading the examples below.

We build up attitudes, beliefs and, dare I say it, scarring labelled as experience. We can plod on through life holding these dear to our hearts and minds.
To give ourselves the best shot at happiness or (where we rate it as a higher priority) fulfilment, we need to ask ourselves some questions.

They consist of a set of more detailed and specific variations of “Does who I am and what I believe serve me best to achieve what I want from life?”
If the answer is no, you are probably living a set of mistaken beliefs.

(For thoroughness, I’d better state that personal integrity can demand that we live a life lacking in elements that would otherwise make us happy. Being happy is not the only criteria for some people – which is OK as long as it is an informed decision and truly based on personal integrity. Generally, however, our state of happiness is usually a good guide).

What we are trying to catch can be called “Self Deceptions”, which is both negative and condemning, or more constructively “Mistakes”. Although I am also guilty of using the former term sometimes (when I’m feeling lazy), it does infer something done deliberately. That is, fortunately, rarely the case. Mistakes can more easily be rectified, while deliberate deception is a far harder beast to tackle.

I will confuse the issue thoroughly now by stating that the type of mistakes I am referring to still do serve to deceive us.

Here are some simple examples:

I am great at social occasions – yet people tend to put up with me rather than actually enjoy my company.

I am a, (and this is one of my favourites!), ‘nice’ person – yet people become bored with me, annoyed at me, and don’t want to form a (loving) relationship with me.

I am worth it, so a potential partner should be willing to ‘work at’ winning my trust – yet I continue to end up with shitty partners.

I have great instincts - yet I continue to end up with shitty partners.

I am fair and open minded – yet my list of ‘dislikes’ continues to grow.

I prefer bad guys/girls (another of my personal favourites) – yet I always end up hurt and alone again.

I’ll stop there for now, as it could be a huge list. I’ll come back to this later, it permeates so much of our relationship lives.
The fact is, if you are alone and/or unhappy, you are either incredible cursed with bad luck (which is extremely rare) or you are living by one or more mistakes.

When we have piled up a quantity of these mistakes, when that shapes the environment we have come to live in, we need to perform ‘Life Style” suicide.

See Part 5.

Relationships –Intermission: Crap advice

I just had to mention this one.

My local paper has an Agony Aunt, a counselor, psychologist etc. So she should know better!
One question-answer item really made me see red.

The letter, condensed:
My husband is a great provider and loves me and the children. Yet, despite being able to repair a car engine in the dark during the evening, he will not do a thing around the house or help me out.

The Agony Aunt reply, condensed:
You say he is a good provider and loves you. Perhaps you should value this and not demand more. Maybe it’s also the way you ask him. Try a different approach. Welcome him home, make him a cup of tea and discuss his day. Show you care and he just might want to do something back.

OK, this IS Asia, but please...

1. What is he providing and who for? Himself, the children he chose to have and the little woman that should be happy to fulfill his needs! He’s certainly not providing something she feels that she needs. The marriage is all about what suits him.

2. Yes, she should try a different approach – like not accepting his selfish behavior. That was her mistake from the very beginning. She accepted his behavior and hence said it was OK.

3. Oh yes, I can see that working. He has no impetus to change, so pampering him even more is going to change that how?

Both the woman writing the letter and the Agony Aunt need to step into the 21st century.
Surely, the days of thinking a man’s occupation is work and a woman staying home looking after the children is leisure time should be long gone.
If he is working 8 – 6, so is she, even though the nature of the work is different.

I fully agree that the nature of his work should play a part, but they must still negotiate arrangements for who does what in the evening – and find a solution that BOTH are happy with.
That is what the marriage is currently lacking.

Negotiation tactics is something I will be covering later, but I will say that is the part of the Agony Aunt reply that I nearly agree with.
Negotiating by attack pushes the other party into a defensive corner, and an amicable settlement then becomes very hard to achieve.
Non attack negotiation, however, does not infer total submissiveness.

This little question answer item illustrates something I have been discussing.
Tolerating leads to resentments and resentments start to undermine a relationship.
That is amply proven by the fact that the letter writer felt the need to write to an Agony Aunt about this.

The Agony Aunt is so saturated by her culture and peer pressure that she forgets everything that she should have learned as a counsellor. Going against a culture IS hard, but that is the only way a positive change can be achieved.

Relationships – Part 4a

A quick note. This site is getting increased numbers of visitors, yet few are commenting. Feedback please people.

OK.

The Reality Check –part a.

‘Reality’ is, I’m sure you know, a hotly debated concept in some circles. For sure, it’s hard to get an objective perspective – which makes it a dangerous term to throw around.

A ’Reality Check’, however, is a different beast. It is not so much a statement of fact, it more usually consists of a comparison – in the form of a question.

The best, and most accurate, Reality Checks are simple in nature . The more complex they become, the less reliable the conclusion. Complexity can be one of the greatest tools of deception, especially self-deception.

Great pre-amble, but what is a ‘Reality Check’?

In its simplest form, either “Does belief (A) match result (B)?” or it’s converse “Does Result (B) confirm belief (A)?”

Here is a common example of a failed Reality Check, drawn from teenage confusion;
“(A) He says he’s wild about me, but (B) he rarely contacts me”.
Mismatch. Failed reality check.

(B) indicates low on his priority list, which does not match (A) “Wild about me”.

Some get this far, but then lose their nerve.
To be effective, do not alter the reality check question.

Where (B) is not the answer desired, do not modify it by applying excuses.

With many, the Reality Check is either ignored or made more complex – “Does he seem wild about me when he doesn’t have other priorities, am I being ‘too demanding’ or ‘needy’?”

Let’s respond to that:

1. Your level of demand or need is your right, and it is part of who you are. Being wild about you must include that level of demand or need. Otherwise, “Wild about you” translates as “Like some things about you”. Failed Reality Check.

2. Pick up phone, dial number, say “Hi, just checking you are OK. Sorry I’m busy, let’s meet as soon as I can”. Time taken, what, 2 minutes? Not willing to sacrifice 2 minutes = “Not wild about you”. Failed Reality Check.

Converting a simple question into something more complicated and/or applying excuses to justify a failed Reality Check is self-deception.

‘Why is he not wild about me?” is a separate issue, it is not part of checking if he really is ‘wild about you’.

Accepting “Wild about you” after the failed Reality Check but remaining unhappy is a cul-de-sac, one based on deception, his and your own.

To many, that blindness seems preferable to accepting the information and having to deal with it.
A huge mistake.

A failed Reality Check does not have to mean “end relationship”.
It does mean that there is a problem with that relationship that needs understanding.
We go from deliberate ignorance to making informed decisions.

More in Part 4 The Reality Check – part b.

Relationships – Part 3

I’ve been covering a lot of ground, and at quite a fast pace, and leaving lots of ‘More later’ promises.

Before I go any further, however, this is a great point to cover one extremely important concept.

When we start a new relationship, we have one of those rare and valuable opportunities in life.

It can best be summed up by a simple sounding sentence.

“It is not who you were, it is who you want to be and can you live up to it”.

Think about the common run of life, of how we both build up our own image of ourselves and also how others see us.

Our parents watch us grow, and they see not only our successes but also our mistakes. Those mistakes are often called ‘failings’. Sadly, parents often – when faced with their children grown into adults – still see that child and insist on maintaining the relationship the way it used to be.

In early relationships, as an adult, we try on a certain persona, and the partner reacts to that persona.We can also build a negative history together, where old hurts and injuries are kept alive.

Both partners can end up re-enforcing that initial persona and it becomes very hard to change. Even when we do, the partner can refuse to believe or accept the change.

One of the common problems in relationships, especially those established while young, comes from friction when either or both partners grow. It is, again sadly, rare for both to grow in the same direction at the same rate. This becomes increasingly difficult when one or both partners demand the other remain the way they used to be. It becomes a balancing act, keeping the partner happy whilst still allowing ourselves to grow.

It is both amazing and impressive when couples actually manage this successfully, as some do.

Many, however, fail.

I think many of us come to a stage in our lives when we ask “How the hell did I become this person?”

Look at the amazing opportunity we have when starting a new relationship.

Some may have experienced this when starting a new job with a new company. We can dump all that garbage, all that history, and have another chance to become who we really want to be.

And how sad is it that so many waste that opportunity. They stick to all those “This is how we always…”, “This is how I always…”

And they fail to ask themselves one very important question “Who I am, what I believe, how I act – do those things actually work for me?”

We have all heard, and probably used, the term ‘Baggage’.

More often than not, it is a coverall for behavior that we don’t like in someone, “He/she had too much baggage”’

Everyone brings something into a new relationship that pre-existed. This can be a job, a house and furniture, children, as well as behavior patterns. Someone once wisely stated “It is not the baggage; it is how we handle it”.

Well, we have a chance to handle it differently with someone new, how stupid to waste that opportunity.

Here is some good news. As many that have hit relationship trouble, and then sought out help, have found - we can start afresh even within an existing relationship – it is just much harder work.

(See, I told you ‘relationships are hard work” is indicative of problems!)

In these blogs I will repeatedly come back to one of the greatest tools we have, the “Reality check”.

In this case, it can be phrased as “Does what I believe, what I demand, what I do, actually achieve what I want? Does the story I tell myself match up with what I really experience?”

I have found an amazingly large number of people continue where the reality check fails.

Coming in Part 4 – The Reality Check.

(Isn't blogging great. Unlike a book, we can hop and skip around like crazy!).

Relationships - Part 2

Another long one....

PART 2

Before I go much further, I need to clarify something.
There is no ideal or “one size fits all’ relationship model.
I will be pointing out what tends to either suit or cause problems for most people. When I ‘bust’ a myth, I am not necessarily saying don’t live by it. I am saying that you should be making informed decisions.
For example (I love examples):
If you are aware of the evidence against a flat Earth, if you know the inherent dangers of believing in a flat Earth, yet still wish to base your life on such a theory – I say good for you, just;
1. Make sure that everyone in a relationship with you understands and is comfortable with it. Ensure that they also are making an informed decision when deciding to be in a relationship with you.
2. Do not try to enforce it on an unwilling participant.

Now that I have stated that, please don’t expect me to keep on pointing it out.
Acknowledge that I am offering information.
Also, please acknowledge that such information is (informed) opinion; I do not claim it as any form of universal objective truth.

I hate that “in my opinion" game. The one that states “Say ‘in my opinion’ and you are modest, don’t say it and you’re an egomaniac”.
Please…..yawn.
It came from my hand/mouth, obviously it’s my opinion – I trust you to work that out for yourself.

OK, let’s continue.

In every relationship, we have three initial responsibilities:

1. To set up a correct level of expectation.
Some mistakenly call this “Honesty”. Look at just about every female profile on a dating site, there will be that word under requirements/what I am looking for. “HONESTY”. What a sad tale that tells.
Let’s break that myth now, (MYTH Number 2) “We must always be honest with each other to have a good relationship”.
Newsflash: honesty is not always a pre-requisite and can sometimes be a fatal mistake.
If one or both partners state up front “I will lie to you when it suits me” and both are happy with that, there is no problem.

Lying can range from little white ones “Oops, I forgot your birthday. BUT. Look in the closet. Wow a present”, through supportive “You look beautiful tonight” despite the fact that they are virtually destroyed by the flu, through persuasive “I do love you, let’s fuck”, and onto destructive “I’m having a night out with the girls” when she is going to see her lover.

We do not require absolute/generic honesty; we do need to define areas where it is essential to us individually. That is part of setting a level of expectation.
One other point, only a fool states “I have caught you out in a lie, you are dishonest, and so we are finished”. You need to understand both the motive and the context of a lie before you can come to such a decision. More later….

2. Setting boundaries and sticking to them.
Accept/tolerate something shitty, then you’d better understand that you are saying that it is OK. Keep on accepting it and you’re driving yourself into a dead end, one that will be very difficult to reverse out of.

Not setting boundaries is grossly unfair to your partner; it is not an act of love. If they don’t know that they have crossed a line, why should they stop doing it? Why shouldn’t they be surprised when, upon doing it for the hundredth time, you suddenly change into someone else that becomes angry?

MYTH Number 3. “We should be tolerant with our partner”.
Sounds good eh? However, when we look at it more analytically, there are two problems with that concept.
a). It is denying a fundamental human right. I have the right to be who I want and to act as I want (though of course, I must accept the consequences of any actions). So do you.
What fundamental arrogance for anyone to believe that they have the right to ‘tolerate’ me! You either accept or you ensure than one of us goes somewhere else.

Acceptance, in this context, places neither partner in a hierarchy – we are different, neither being superior nor inferior.
Such hierarchical approaches are destructive unless both partners have selected such a relationship as desirable.

b). More often than not, such tolerance is totally artificial. It is more usually a point scoring mechanism, with an attached incurrence of debt.
“I have accrued x tolerance points, that entitles me to (x * Factor y) benefits.”
And again, usually the tolerated partner only finds out about the debt when the one tolerating decides to call it in. More later…


3. Start with fresh eyes, fresh mind and fresh heart.
This is based on a concept that will be very difficult to stomach:- you have probably learned very little of use from any previous relationships.

“Ah”, you will probably say, “I have learned what I do and do not like!”
The fact is, however, what may be likeable or unlikeable from one person may actually be the opposite with someone else.
Everyone will, eventually, do or say something that recalls a bad memory from some previous relationship – but it is a different person doing it with (probably/hopefully) a different motive.
Everything is contextual. Don’t consider scarring as experience or wisdom. More later…

PART 3 will expand on some of these “More Later” statements

Relationships – Sigh…

OK, let’s do it, let’s tackle one of the biggies.

I’ll be concentrating on loving relationships (Male-Male, Male-Female and Female-Female), but there is something well worth remembering. Every interaction we have with every living thing, (and some inanimate things), is a relationship – be it with a dog, workmate, girlfriend or Grannie Biggins. This discussion will, therefore, both draw on and be relevant to all forms of relationship. I’ll point out where they diverge.

For the moment, I will be talking about a relationship with someone that does not have a serious physical, mental or emotional problem. We may, however, discover along the way that most people are not totally free of all three conditions – hence my using the qualifier “serious”!

Over three decades of counseling, I have seen most of the fallacies, myths, conventional wisdoms and urban legends. If you hold any of these dear to you, tough shit – I’ll be hammering them.

This IS a huge subject, so…

PART 1 (I haven’t planned out how many parts yet).

Two people can be attracted to each other, right. Whether that is because her nose looks like a red-arsed baboon’s labia, he reminds you of the one male in your life to ever show kindness (Uncle Bert), or simply because she has great tits, it really doesn’t matter. It also doesn’t matter whether or not those attractions are the result of ‘our animal heritage’. Those theories are great for anthropologists or social scientists, but for the rest of us it’s OK to just know it happens. We usually draw on those theories when we want to make excuses for some bad behavior.

So, the big question is, “what do we do when it does happen, when we have that attraction?”

I’ll go into some of the aspects of turning that attraction into a relationship later, first there is an important point I need to make.

Let’s jump the gun, look at existing relationships, and hit MYTH NUMBER ONE.
It can be summed up by a simple sentence, and when I hear some version of it I want to take a sledge hammer and knock some sense into the speaker’s thick, dumb skull.
“Relationships are work, and too many are not prepared to put in the effort, preferring to just run away”.

Bull fucking shit!

Here’s my reply: “If your relationship is work, you’ve got a real problem. You’re probably not compatible”.
Most people make the mistake of confusing half-love with full-love.
Half love is when you love some things about someone but not others.
Never commit on the basis of half-love. I’ll go into that in more depth later. (I’ll keep saying “more later”, this is a big subject with a lot of ground to cover).

All those things that make a relationship work, all those things that keep it vital and enduring, they are FUN.
More often than not, they are also the very things that made us decide to have a relationship.

Much of that ‘work’ concept is based around the misunderstood and misused word “Compromise”.
In my experience, which is extensive, compromise usually means that one person get’s what they want and the other put’s up with it. That is not compromise, it is control. In a true compromise, both parties walk away truly happy with the result.

Here is an example:

The Issue;
He wants to watch sport on TV and she wants to watch her favorite soap opera. (Nice, using stereotypes eh, should make everyone feel comfortable).

Compromise as control:
“I get to watch my sport, then I won’t go all silent and moody, I’ll be nice and even tempered”. One partner gets what they want, the other makes a ‘sacrifice’ for the sake of good relations.

Compromise with winners and losers:
“You get to watch sport every first and third week of the month, and I watch soap operas during the other weeks”. That means that, every week, there is a winner and a loser.

True Compromise:
“Hey, we’ll cut back on going out and buy a second TV”. No winners, no losers (except maybe a restaurant or film theatre), everyone is happy.

Much of the marital or relationship ‘work’ is based around choosing either example 1 or 2. Both lead to resentments, eventually.

Let’s look at another aspect of that ‘work’.

“Life is full of problems and stress, we all get tired sometimes, we can’t be perfect all the time. We have to accept that and understand when our partner is not at their best”.

Do we?

There is a vast difference between “Being supportive” and “Taking shit”. I fully agree with the former, I reject totally the latter.
I’ll listen to you, I’ll have your head on my shoulder, I’ll make you a nice cup of tea, and I’ll see if there is anything I can do to lessen the burden. I’ll even understand if you need to shout, scream and curse – as long as it is not directed at me. That’s being supportive. I‘ll not indulge you in making me your whipping boy, and I’ll not accept you insisting on also making my life a misery. That is taking shit.

This takes us very handily onto the next concept, relationship negotiation and setting boundaries.

More in PART 2.

Middle Class Terrorists

I was working on some of the blogs I promised, but something happened that deserved priority. I really had to post this one.

A friend had lost her internet service for a few days and I let her use mine, which involved her coming to my house and using my computer.
The nature of our relationship was such that she was quite happy to have me sit next to her while she opened her email account.

I was, quite frankly, stunned – 247 unopened!

She was obviously an indiscriminate surfer; for she rapidly deleted 50 spam mails and 20 newsletters from organizations she really had no interest in.

OK, what of the remaining 177?

5 were legitimate messages from real friends or relatives.
That left 172, and they all came from just two people.

I sat for an hour while she opened each of these in turn. There was a motley collection of funny/amusing images and cartoons, a few FUD (Fear, uncertainty and Doubt) articles, and some chain letters (“read this, then pass on to 10 friends to assure lifetime happiness”), but the rest all held PowerPoint attachments.

As she watched each one in turn, two things struck me:

1. Whether intentional or otherwise, these were an amazing terrorist tactic to clog up the internet. Imagine how many people were receiving these, and then forwarding them to a list of ‘friends’. Try to calculate the terabytes of feel good crap clogging up servers across the world.

2. They all had the same formulaic structure and content. Soporific music, a soothing voice, and seemingly bland (more on this later), comforting middle class messages.

The first you can easily make up your own mind about, but I want to look at the latter in more depth.

When looked at with a slightly more objective, analytical eye, they were immensely dangerous.
I am no conspirator theorist, but I gradually came to the conclusion that only a few had been created by smug would be Gurus, the rest had been specifically designed to sell a horrific set of subliminal messages.

When I asked my friend to step through a couple with me, pausing at each of the pages, clarifying the message and its inherent hypocrisies and dangers, she sometimes agreed, but more often than not her eyes glazed over and her hackles rose. It was not simply that she felt she had to disagree, it was more that she began to feel embattled, that the stable basis of her life was being threatened by me.
I began to realize that the years of hearing these messages had done their job, she was brainwashed.
She could not deny what I was saying, she had no reasoned or logical counter to it, yet everything about her stated “I will not listen”.

I gave up.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I was not seeing the bogeyman under the bed. Some of the messages were just space wasting, ‘yeah I can agree with that’ pap.
The ‘smile at a stranger and make the world a happier place’ – sure, your smile is going to make a man forget that his wife just left him and he was entrenched etc, but what the hell.
The ‘think positive and you will get everything you want’. OK, except I keep positive thinking that a meteor will land in my garden, turn out to be a huge diamond, and make me wealthy beyond belief – but it hasn’t happened yet.

No, it’s only when we get beyond them.

There is a trick that most partisan ‘survey’ specialists know, a way to lead the interviewee into the answer you want.
e.g.
“Do you think it is OK that children in the US are still starving?”, of course not.
“Do you think the government has unlimited funds at its disposal?’, of course not.
”Do you believe that charity begins at home?”, of course.
“Should we be spending billions on foreign aid instead of investing the money at home?’.
Err, no, I suppose not.

That is how these PowerPoint presentations work.
A series of beautiful photographs, soothing music, scrolling messages, each line revealed after you have swallowed the last. Everything carefully designed to switch off your analytical awareness.

And what are these messages?

It is fine to build up personal wealth at the expense of others.
It is OK to suppress the rights of others if they are contrary to our belief system.
We can sit back smugly surrounded by our nice, comfortable material world as long as we pray each night.
Life is precious if it is white, middle class conservative. (I loved the way my friend swallowed this last, despite her being Chinese!).
Non-white people can be beautiful as long as it’s hard to tell they are not white.
It is great to praise Jesus, it’s dumb to follow everything he said if it is contrary to our comfortable existence.
The list just went on and on.

The next time you get one of these, switch off the sound, pause the scrolling, ask yourself “What am I really being asked to accept?”

Ask yourself if you really want to clog up the internet and continue the brainwashing by passing these bloody things on.