Forgiveness, Friendship, Kinship, Family ---- Fun

This is just a start

Let's say you got divorced

You
"moved on"

You
"got closure"


Which means, usually, you left behind the other,
the problems, the connection

You might still
"be friends"

but it's not really a friendship, because all the stuff that bothered
you
still bothers you,
and you don't have to deal with it

so you are friends with benefits,
but not THAT way,
the way, of friends with the benefit of having judgment about

WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU,
AND
IT'S SO GREAT NOT TO BE WITH YOU,
WHEW

And this goes both ways,
they think you kinda suck,
and are glad to be free

And there you go

This is pale friendship

And here's where forgiveness comes in
and I'm going to just start the conversation about forgiveness
because there are many layers

All the way from
forgiving someone for not returning a phone call
to
forgiving someone for murdering one's child

And there is an inner freedom,
always
in any forgiving

You are giving up
that clinching to the story
that reality
in some past moment
"should"
( the famous SHOULD)
have been different

And there are layers of how you can feel
about the other person's behavior

You can relax about certain types of "sins"
and actually be charmed by them in retrospect

Someone murdering your child
will never be charming
But you can let go of hatred
You can let go of anger
You can let go of wanting to punish

And you can
become the friend of the one you have given up
on holding the invisible hammer
in your hand,
always available to whack them upside the head
for their crime

And what does friendship mean?

And kinship?

And Family?

And can you have fun, with someone you divorced because they
were awful in their language toward you ,
or their behavior?

Well, if you've got children,
you not only can figure this out--
it behooves you to,

because then your children grow up
to be free
to see
that real alive and mindful
and
happy
adults

can take quarrels and judgments
and let them go
and see the best in each other
see it so well,
that they can set up a situation
so
Sally and Ben,
the new couple,

And Joe and Betty the other new couple
(it was Joe and Sally to start with)
can get together and enjoy each other
and all the merged kids can feel
loved
and can
have
fun


This isn't going to be easy.

And it's going to be worth it,
don't you think?

Much more on this in days and weeks to come
Cheers
Chris

Love and Hate, Anger and Having Fun with that

Recently I took a ten month training in male female relationships.

One of the key learnings was this:

"The opposite of love isn't hate. It's indifference."

This is going to be a two, or three or four part series.

It's going to dance this new dance I'm excited to be exploring: to improve the lives of our autistic children, we are privileged and challenged to upgrade the way we DO all of our relationships.

Let's start with an early breakthrough.
I once had this girlfriend who would yell.
Loudly.

Mistakes I made:
Yelling back.
Telling her to stop.
Telling her she was bad for yelling.

Here's a breakthrough I made:
You can go ahead and yell,
but it hurts my ears.
I want to stand about twenty feet away and listen to you.
You yell.
I listen where it doesn't hurt my ears.


Anger is a strong wish to communicate.
It's primitive: the communication is
I'm not getting my way and I want to hit/ bite/ kill you.
But it is a communication.

Later: if the yelling or the anger or the tantrum "works",
then the yelling becomes part communication
and part behavior modification strategy.

On their part,
the yeller,
the tantrum one,
the roar around the house angry one.

If they have you trained to
either:
Do what they want
or
Make a big fuss ( thereby giving them attention)

then the anger can be a grooved in strategy:

I growl and
You give me attention

or

I growl and
You let me have my way

or even, (gad, human beings)

I growl and
You feel badly about yourself
( are punished)


So:
What to do with the child, autistic or not,
who is having a tantrum

Listen a bit

Take a guess:

You seem to be angry because you didn't
get your way about....

Or, if no guess...

I don't have a clue about what's bothering
you.
it's clear something is
Finish up your yelling and then come tell me

Either way:
Communicate that you hear they want to say something
AND
you'll wait them out
in another part of the room
until they are ready to talk to, or act with you,
in a way that works as
more congenial communication

(Later, when they are teenagers,
or even earlier,
they might say:
"I hate you."

I'd respond.
"Good. You are angry. I hate you sometimes, for a few seconds, and I always love you.
What is the anger about?
I love you when you are angry. And if you tell me about it I'll listen.
If you yell, I'll get far away and listen.
And then when you are tired of that , come talk to me,
or come on around for a hug." )


This is just a start.
But it's a good start.

They love you.
They want love.

Tantrum, anger, roaring around will die
out if you pull out the
two plugs:

the giving worried attention plug

the fighting back against their anger plug

and the giving in to them plug


What's left

be happy

be present

read a book, draw a picture, be chill
( I'd advise against getting on the phone or the computer,
but talking to another real person in front of them is great as a counter example of real non-yelling communication)

Have fun

Learn

You aren't perfect.
So what.

Keep trying.

Vows for Relationship Enlightenment, part 2

12.To speak the truth.
This was in #2. As in saying this, which could be true:
"I feel angry."
Rather than this, which is a lie: "I feel angry because you ...."
The real truth is "I let my anger come out when I tell myself the story that you should..."

And to speak the truth means more:
"I want to be a big baby and have you all to myself."

"I want you to worship and adore me, when I want attention,
and I want to be ignored and let alone when I want time to myself."

"I want you to read my mind,
and know what I want without me having to articulate it."

I.e. To speak the humorous truth of my own self centered nonsense.

Which is to say the egoic mind, the me, me, me fellow who thinks it is
Me vs the world.

La, la.
To speak the truth of my lies, any lie that demands another be under my control.

13. I vow to live an awakened life.
As much as I can.
And I vow to create conditions for you to live an awakened life.
As much as you wish.

This does NOT mean lectures, advice, programs. It means listening. Being curious. Searching for an awareness of the unique brilliance of your being alive, right now.

As I can vow to connect with the unique brilliance of my being alive, right now.

Good.

Relationship Heaven

Is your relationship heaven?

Is that honeymoon flavor there most of the time?

Are you excited to find out new aspects of each other
every week, if not every day?

Is touch, truth and fun continually improving?

Can you talk about anything and everything, including
the sweetness of sex with its various tangles of desire and obligation,
and money with its seemingly endless ramifications?

Are you present with each other?

Are you deeply in love?

I hope so.

If not, that's my main treat and service for the world now,
helping others to the love that could be, and maybe even "should"
be, at the center of all lives.

Real love, real work, real awakening, real connection to the Earth,
real service.

All good stuff.

Ciao
for
NOW,

Chris

Special vs Holy Relationship: Course of Miracles via Marianne Williamson

This quote is in the relationships section
comparing
(recall all the power of the idea
of learning as the increased perception of differences)
"unholy relationship"
and a holy one:

"For an unholy relationship is based of
differences,
where each thinks the other has what
they have not.
They come together, each to rob the other.
They stay until they think that there is nothing
left
to steal, and then
move on.
And so they wander through a world of
strangers,
unlike themselves [actually like themselves, in their weird
pseudo isolation, but thinking everyone is unlike]
living in their bodies perhaps under a common
roof
that shelter neither;
in the same room and yet a world apart.

A holy relationship
starts from a different promise.
EAch one has looked within
and seen no lack.
Accepting their own completion, each would extend
it by
joining
with the other, whole as themselves."

And holy wholey as two/ one.

This is from Marianne Williamson's
A Return to Love.

The quote is from the Course on Miracles
and then she goes on to increase clarity
on this distinction.

Of the wanting to get
vs wanting to share variety:

other has to shape up
vs other is grand

other should "behave" according to our program
vs other should shake us up a little or lot and get us
to expand loving

and so on

Get it and read yourself.

This is a nice quote of hers, though:

"Our ego is merely our fear.
We all have egos, that doesn't make us bad people.
Our egos are not where we are bad,
but where we are wounded."