![]() This week, I’ve been thinking about life visions and how they affect our romantic relationships. (I know. You’re shocked that I want to revisit this relationship thing, aren’t you?) Single or not, there exist perils that threaten our best opportunities to Live in Relationship-Joy. Given that none of my single friends seem to be any happier than any of my long-term, married friends, and vice-versa, my question is: is there any way to ensure that we experience our own best-life-we-can-imagine, either with or without a significant other? It seems like, if we are single, we are all too willing to sacrifice some pieces of what we envision as our best life, just to feel some kind of sense of love and belonging. I certainly have done that. In fact, while in one of my most long-term relationships, I sacrificed my perfect financial picture, my ideal home, my spiritual dedication, my community camaraderie, and my health (or at least my safety). Why? Because I felt loved, needed, and important. I had met my relationship goals at the cost of all other dreams. Often, as I watch some of my girlfriends start to date someone new, they ask themselves, “Can I or can I not live with this man?” I hear answers like, “You’ve got to take the good with the bad,” and “No relationship is perfect.” True. But how close to your dream-life are you? And what’s close enough? While single people are giving-up pieces of their best visions in order to couple, people who are in committed relationships are uncoupling in order to retrieve their claim to their best visions. I am reminded of my parents, who divorced after 23 years of marriage, because they were “very different people.” Not long after their divorce, each of them was spending as much time as they could on the water. My mom was shocked to hear that my dad was sailing in the U.S. Virgin Islands, and my dad was shocked to hear that my mom was sailing to the Dry Tortugas. As it turned out, their lives remained fairly parallel for years after their divorce, because they, apparently, were not as “different,” in their individual concepts of how to live the "most beautiful life" as they had once thought. Of course, focused instead on their day to day struggles, they had never successfully talked about what they both really wanted. (Is anyone else hearing the 1970’s “Pina Colada Song,” right now?) It would seem, then, that one of the most important things we can do with any partner or potential partner is talk about these visions, these dreams of what life would look like if it could look like anything we choose. I wonder how much less compromising we would do while we were single and dating, if we knew up-front that the person across the table from us was on a completely different dream page. On the other hand, if we knew that our visions of what makes life worth living were parallel, could we overlook the way he holds his fork, or the fact that she has a checkered table cloth on her kitchen table? (Really. These are actual reasons why second dates have not occurred.) And I wonder how much more joy we could experience within our current committed relationships if we knew how many of our dreams were shared. Imagine the synergy of having two distinct people working together toward that perfect-life vision… toward your perfect-life vision! At the very least, and to avoid certain heartbreak, isn’t it worth asking the question, “What would you be, have and do, if you believed you could be, have and do anything at all?” Of course, if you ask that question you need to be able to answer the question, yourself. So, can you?
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Well, as promised in my last blog on Maslow, I am reporting my well-intentioned but limited success at spreading the feeling of love and belonging, in order to feel more of it, myself.
It turns out that it's quite possible that the reason my Love and Belonging cup is not overflowing is because I am a dork. I did, indeed, go to my women's group. I enthusiastically greeted the first woman to walk into the room. "Hello, Pam*! It's wonderful to see you, again, this week!" She looked at me, trying to smile but missing it, barely, and said, "My name is Paula*." Oh, brother. This is harder than I want it to be. Maybe just my standard, "Hi, there!" next time. It's not nearly as effective as using names, but surely has to be better than getting a name wrong. Ugh. (Fortunately, I think she forgave me. I had taken cream-puffs to the meeting. Cream-puffs cure almost any faux pas, if you ask me.) Have a beautiful Friday! *The names have been changed to protect the innocent. Intentionally. I actually do know her real name, now. I’ve been spending a lot of time, over the last year or so, thinking about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs and our societal and personal ills. For those of you who may have forgotten your Psych 101 course, Maslow’s Hierarchy is a life map that acknowledges that certain needs must be met before others can be fulfilled. In order of priority, physical needs must be met first. We need air, water and food, for example, before we need great poetry. The sum of our lives, then, is presumably spent climbing up that pyramid of needs. We seek food, water and air, and once relatively certain that we have those things available, we seek Safety and Security… shelter, job security, etc. The next need we seek to fulfill, after Safety and Security needs are met, is the need for Love and Belonging.
It seems to me that, as a society, living in America, we have physical and safety needs largely met. Although there are exceptions to the rule, we are no longer hunting for food and afraid of starving to death if there is a 45 day drought. We are no longer living in the early industrial age, for example, where even showing up to work posed a serious threat to our safety. As a whole, we are now trying to find our way through the Love and Belonging stage. We want to feel special. We want to feel loved. We want to feel love for those around us. We want to feel as though we belong… to a team, to a family, to a partner. We want to have found our place where we “fit-in.” Maslow’s theory has some holes in it, and, certainly, there are critics who point-out that we vacillate between stages more than we conquer one and move to the other. That said, if I accept the theory at face value, I can see how a lot of our societal ills are a manifestation of our attempts to conquer this stage. If you think about people who stay in relationships that aren’t healthy, or teens who join gangs, or young people engaging in promiscuous behaviors, for example, you might be able to see how these behaviors are simply ill-fated attempts to feel Love and Belonging. Even our skyrocketing divorce rates can be a reflection of this, as people are leaving relationships or having affairs. No longer are people satisfied, staying in relationships in order to keep bills paid. We need more than safety and security. We need to feel loved, cherished and appreciated. My good friend and counselor, Monte King, addressed this in the Living in Joy workshop last month. He talked about how we are going to wells that are just as dry as our own, looking to spouses and lovers who are as stressed as we are, as exhausted as we are, as needy as we are, and hoping that they will fill us up. We are bound to be disappointed. Even when we look to prayer, or meditation, or a power greater than ourselves (I call Him, “God”), we sometimes have difficulty actually feeling loved. We can know we are loved, or believe we are loved, or have faith that we are loved, but actually feeling loved and like we belong is very different. So, what are we to do? It may disappoint you to know that I don’t have the perfect answer. I do, however, have a theory. I know that when I gossip about others, I start to suspect they are gossiping about me. I know that if I dislike others, I am certain they dislike me. I know that if I am unfaithful or lying, I imagine others are unfaithful and lying to me, as well. If this “Freudian Projection,” as it is called in psychological circles, happens with negative emotions and behaviors, then doesn’t it follow that it would also happen with positive ones? Like love, and feeling like we belong, for example? Can we, as part of our learning and mastering of the Love and Belonging level of Maslow’s Hierarchy, intentionally find things to love about others and accept others, in order to feel our own sense of Love and Belonging? Can we forgive the times that they do not show us love and acceptance, and just love them, anyway? And can we stop looking for ways and reasons that others do not belong in our circles or at our workplaces or in our families, and start celebrating all of the reasons to accept them, open-armed, and with a loving heart? It sounds absurdly challenging to me. So, this week, I am going to do two things: First, I am going to go back to the women’s group to which I didn’t feel much like I belonged, and engage myself by making an effort to help everyone else feel welcome. Second, I am going to show love and acceptance to some person I feel “deserves it” least. I am going to have a conversation and actually listen. I am going to smile, and greet them warmly, and I am going to tell them, “Thank you,” for something I might not normally notice. Want to try it with me? I’d love to hear how it goes for you. I’ll report back, too. Have a great week! I have a friend who says that people would rather be right than happy.
Think about that. It’s a big assertion. What does it mean? I remember talking to some of the girls that work with me. I asked, “Why is it that people always anticipate the worst possible outcome, instead of focusing on the best that could happen?” Answer: “Because people don’t want to be disappointed. If they anticipate the worst, and get the worst, they aren’t let down. But if they anticipate the best, and get the worst, they look stupid.” So, anticipating the worst doesn’t feel good (i.e. makes you unhappy), but it’s better than being wrong. Honestly! What is so important about being right? Are our egos so fragile that we think being wrong will crush us? Would we rather make a list of cons before we make a list of pros, just to protect ourselves? From what, exactly? It seems to me that, if we live expecting the best, we are in joy as we anticipate the coming of that best. Whereas, if we live expecting the worst, we are in dread as we anticipate the coming of the worst. Of the two mindsets, regardless of the actual outcome, I think I’d rather live happily anticipating the best. Then, if the worst happens and I am surprised by it, at least I have had a period of time prior to that wherein I was joyful. I am reminded, also, of some of the irrelevant spats I used to have with my ex. We would fight about some of the least important details, until one of us would prove the other wrong. Oh, perfect. So the relationship takes a beating for the sake of “I told you so?” Again, right, but not happy. I am going to start looking for this. I wonder how often I fight to be right at the expense of my own joy or the joy of those around me. I think that’s why they say, “Ignorance is bliss.” I think not having the burden to be right all the time could truly be the road to happiness. Of course, I could be wrong. |
ShellyWhether I am experiencing my life as a nurse, leader, teacher, manager, wife, daughter, friend or something else, I believe that my gift has been my ability to sort through the noise of emotions and circumstances and find joy in all things. It is my purpose to use that ability to help others realize their own strengths, successes, gifts and passions. This is how I want to spend my life. Subscribe
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