Do we really need to ask why a preoccupation with the big issues eventually leads to failure and unhappiness in careers, in relationships, and in regard to your personal health and well-being? When it comes to your health, what happens when you wait until things get really bad (a crisis) before looking for treatment? Don’t you then find yourself racing to beat the pathology to the finish line? The closer you allow issues to come to the tipping point (that point at which failure is unavoidable), the more important and urgent the need to engage in corrective action becomes, and the lesser your chances of meeting that challenge successfully. At the same time, the more your resources are dedicated to handling any crisis, the greater the chances will be for other issues to approach their tipping points.

Conserving your energies to handle the big issues does little to address or solve them; in fact, the approach that focuses only (or mainly) on the important things risks creating an error cascade. Let me explain. An error cascade begins with just one overlooked detail. When that detail goes wrong, it becomes an attention grabber (Quadrant One again). While your attention is focused on taking care of that one errant detail, you ignore several other details that are needing your attention. As your attention is drawn away in a rapidly-increasing complex of (relatively) minor failures, your capacity for reacting to the situation erodes until you are unable to stop a catastrophic collapse of the system. The disasters at Three Mile Island and, to an even greater degree, at Chernobyl are graphic cases in point.

As early as the 14th Century, we find the following poem:

For Want of a Nail

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.

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Must couples in trouble necessarily fail? No, not necessarily: no healthy couple is doomed to failure. In fact, the only ‘doomed’ relationships are those where one or both partners are unapologetically physically or emotionally abusive . Without a doubt, the only realistic option for someone who finds her- or himself in a fundamentally abusive or exploitative relationship is to exit immediately. Apart from that, I believe that many (if not all) relationships “on the rocks” could be healed under the right circumstances. From my perspective, the fact that this healing so often fails to take place could be an indication that one or both of the partners have stopped listening. Additionally, ceasing to listen indicates a spiritual problem. Let me explain.

It would seem that the  person who hears another’s voice, but is no longer committed to listening to what the other has to say has given up on her or his partner, as well as their relationship together. If you look more closely, however, it soon becomes clear that the person has actually given up on him- or herself. Empathetic listening and appreciative inquiry represent a three-fold choice: 1) to accept the other, 2) to trust the other, and 3) to engage with the other. Closing off the lines of communication also represents a choice: to cease accepting, trusting and engaging with one’s partner. Before I relate this to fundamental spiritual principles, let’s look briefly at each choice.

The choice to accept another human being is foundational. True acceptance represents a fundamental option to see in the other person another self, with exactly the same sorts of strengths and weaknesses that we ourselves possess. This choice to acknowledge the other person as another self  has two destructive opposites. The first perversion of acceptance we call ‘exploitation‘. Philosopher Martin Buber contrasts these approaches with the terms I-Thou (for true acceptance of the other), and I-It (for exploitation). To see your partner merely in terms of his or her usefulness (like a tool or a piece of furniture) or her or his capacity to satisfy you represents a fundamental denial of humanity on your part. The second perversion of the choice to accept your partner shows itself as conditional acceptance. In brief, “I’ll accept you if you do such-and-such or so-and-so.” Conditional acceptance of another puts you in the position of being their judge, jury and executioner. In fact, it represents nothing less than your attempt to usurp the position in your partner’s life properly held by God alone.

Next, let’s look at the choice not to trust your partner. Why don’t you trust her or him? Because you’ve been hurt before? The refusal to trust your partner goes way beyond self-preservation. Once again, it is passing a judgment of condemnation on another person — another self — who exhibits the same sorts of faults and failings that you yourself exhibit. In fact, if the truth were known, the faults and failings that you find most easy to condemn and most difficult to forgive in others are the very ones that you exhibit most strongly yourself. In fact, the two keys that are absolutely essential to unlocking both acceptance and trust are these: first, to acknowledge an identical humanity in both yourself and the other, and, second, to commit yourself to the path of unconditional forgiveness. Who cannot look at the plight of even the most desperate of people around us and not be able truthfully to say, “There, but for the grace of God, go I?” The greatest message of Christianity — and also, I’m afraid,  its most forgotten and neglected — is simply this: unconditional, unlimited forgiveness. If you cannot forgive unconditionally, you cannot trust for very long.

The final choice is the choice to engage with your partner. If you refuse to engage with her or him, you thereby give credence to the (Jungian) ego’s false belief that you are vulnerable and need protection. It’s the same force that drives people’s frantic searching for that illusive (and illusory) ‘security’ that they believe will fix everything and protect them from danger. Once again, it would be foolish to put ourselves in harm’s way by engaging with an abusive partner. We owe it to ourselves and to them to take the necessary precautions so as not to allow ourselves to become victims of deliberate abuse. However, if you imagine that refusing to engage with your well-intentioned partner will grant you some sort of immunity from harm and from hurt, you are mistaken. Do you believe that spiritually you are invulnerable and that nothing outside of yourself — not even death — can destroy the essence of you? “Greater love has no one,” we have heard, “than to lay down his life for another.” Oddly, dieing for someone can actually be a whole lot easier than living for them.

Finally, what does the choice not to listen say about that person’s spiritual condition? The testimony it gives is nothing short of damning. Personally, I would liken it to what Christians refer to as the ‘sin against the Holy Spirit’ or the ‘unforgivable sin.’ Here’s what I mean. Whenever I write, I use the terms ‘acceptance,’  ‘trust’ and ‘engagement’ as  synonyms for what are called the ‘theological virtues’, namely: faith, hope , and love. The ‘sin’ against faith is the decision not to accept the will of God exactly as we encounter it in our world. The ‘sin’ against hope is the choice not to trust that our only Source of genuine security is divine providence. The ‘sin’ against love is the refusal to become meaningfully engaged with those we were sent to serve: our fellow creatures who, along with us, share the “image and likeness of God.” If the ‘sin against the Holy Spirit’ is a refusal to believe that the love of God is powerful enough to forgive us (and so we refuse to ask for forgiveness, and therefore refuse to accept it), then turning a deaf ear to someone we once claimed to love is a ‘sin against love’, for, as we know, the opposite of love is not hate, but deliberate indifference.

What can you do if you find yourself failing to listen? Remember the futility of protecting yourself. What can you protect yourself from? Even more importantly, what are you protecting yourself for? After all, your mission here in this world is not to try (futilely) to keep yourself safe. It’s to share with your fellows (and especially those in relationship with you) the same kind of acceptance, trust, and engagement that your God has shown to you. God hears his people’s cry . . . can you do any less?

And what about you who find yourself ‘learning to love one another’ and your words keep falling on deaf ears? You, too, have the opportunity to pass on the love of God. Your acceptance of the other can be renewed continually. Your trust of the other need never fail or fade. You may stand ever at the ready to engage. However, engagement (love) requires reciprocity. God does not condemn, so how could you? God does not constrain, either (because love can never be forced), but rather waits for all eternity for the other to emerge from his or her isolation and re-engage. You can have the willingness to re-engage, whether or not the other ever seeks it. You may never re-engage as you once did: time and the world goes on while the other chooses to isolate, stagnate, or (what’s worse) repeat the same self-defeating choices and behaviors with other partners. You, on the other hand, have the opportunity to accept and trust and engage with people at every stage and every condition of your life: people who, like you, have chosen to listen not only with their ears, but with their hearts.

H. Les Brown, MA, CFCC
Copyright © 2010 H. Les Brown

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During my discussion last week with Jim Duzak, "The Attorney at Love" who was my guest on the Midlife Matters internet radio program, I learned that many people who still care for each other break up because they have given up on trying to communicate with each other. When communication breaks down, then relationships break down, and then both party's sense of personal well-being becomes compromised. I truly believe that many work and personal relationships (and egos) could be salvaged, if people only worked at perfecting the skills involved in resolving conflict and coming to consensus (meaning, "I can live with that decision"). As a coach, I've learned a great deal about how people communicate, and as a partner in a committed relationship (fourteen years last Friday), I've learned how hard it is to implement those lessons. What follows is the result of my personal knowledge and experience.

Here are The Midlife Master's Rules of Engagement:

• Keep your purpose in mind. Your purpose ought to be to resolve the disagreement and come to a resolution of your differences. Too often people allow the heat of the moment to distract them into heading off on tangents until the partners suddenly discover that they can't remember what they're arguing about. Stick to the point. Whenever you find yourself off-topic (and off-task), gently bring yourself back to the main issue. If there's a question whether or not to bring in another topic use this rule of thumb: "When in doubt, don't!"

• You can disagree without being disagreeable. There's a difference between fighting and arguing. It's the difference between heat and light. An agreeable conclusion is always possible so long as both of you approach the discussion with good will. You can have a very animated discussion without getting nasty about it. Many of the rules that follow are tools that you can use to diffuse conflict and keep the discussion on a healthy, respectful, and non-hurtful plane. The purpose of your discussion is not to determine who's right and who's wrong, but, rather, to come to a conclusion that you can both live with.

• Talk about the subject, not your partner. This is just a corollary of the first rule: keep your purpose in mind. Your purpose is to resolve the issue not to change your partner. You're unlikely to effect a change in anyone's behavior other than your own. You have no control over how your partner behaves, either inside or outside the current discussion, so trying to change him or her is most likely an exercise in futility and a waste of your breath. Focus on the point at hand and let your partner deal with him- or herself.

• Avoid trigger words. The word 'why' is unique among words in the English language (and that may very well be true in other languages, as well). For whatever reason, the limbic brain interprets the word 'why' as a direct challenge that triggers a pre-conscious reaction from the autonomic nervous system: the 'fight, flight or freeze' response. In other words, asking 'why' puts your partner immediately on the defensive without his or her even being aware of it. Since your object is to seek resolution of the issue at hand, putting your partner in the discussion on the defensive defeats your purpose (he or she can no longer hear you). Using other similar words can avoid this problem (for example: 'what was the reason' is not a trigger).

• Avoid absolutes and exaggeration. You do yourself no favor by over-stating your case. The words 'always' and 'never' have no place in an argument, since they are always an exaggeration and they are never accurate. Using exaggeration almost always pushes the discussion off-topic, because it provides a perfect excuse to focus on the inaccuracies in your statement rather than the subject at hand. The very worst approach you can take is to start a statement with "Why do you always . . . "

• Avoid advice-giving and lecturing. Here are some more words that signal trouble in your discussion: 'you need to', 'you ought to', and 'you should' (as well as 'why don't you'). These phrases signal that your aim is to change and/or control your partner's behavior rather than seeking common ground. As I mentioned before, the only person whose behavior you can influence — particularly in an argument — is your own. If you can keep your attention focused on the subject rather than on your partner, you will avoid the temptation to change the focus of the discussion from it to him or her.

• Avoid impugning your partner's motives. Only God knows the secret motives of the heart. Even a trained and licensed psychiatrist can only come to a conclusion regarding another's motives based on what he or she has been told. No matter how well you know your partner, you have no real idea what's going on inside his or her head. You are perfectly free to disagree with your partner's statements about his or her reasons for doing or saying something (you can certainly say, "I don't believe you"), but you do not have the right to speculate about what the real reasons may be ("You're only saying/doing that because . . . ").

• Avoid injustice-collecting. Once again, this is a corollary to the rule about sticking to the topic at hand. Someone who practices injustice collecting operates from what I call a 'victim mentality.' That means that you suffer in silence when things don't go your way. There's also no 'forgiving and forgetting' for an injustice collector — anything your partner's ever done that you didn't like is fair game. Dredging up old garbage (either never properly handled at the time or not fully atoned for in your own mind) only muddies the water, puts your partner on the defensive, and spells doom for the purpose of your discussion. Don't do it, and don't allow your partner to do it to you.

• Avoid ultimatums. This is just another reminder that you're not in control of your partner's behavior. Furthermore, you're not going to generate good will by attempting to force an issue. Most times, an ultimatum is a bluff, and, in anger, your partner may be just in the mood to call it. Even if it's not a bluff, putting consequences in the form of an ultimatum puts the power over your own decisions into the hands of your partner. Saying "If you do this, I'll do that" puts you in a bind. It's perfectly acceptable to say, "I can't live with that . . . if you decide to do that, I'm going to have to consider my options."

• Watch your body language. Only about 1/3 of our interpersonal communication happens through our words alone (that's why e-mails can be so dangerous: they lack the other 67%). Most of what we communicate happens through our tone of voice and body language. It's a real challenge to develop such self-awareness that you stay cognizant of your tone, your facial expressions, your gestures and posture (while concentrating on what's being said) to such a degree that your non-verbal statements communicate only what you consciously intend.

• Keep your cool and your dignity. Feeling anger during a heated discussion is healthy. Acting on the anger is not. It is never OK to be physically, verbally, or emotionally abusive for the sake of winning an argument. When you yield your self control to the feelings of the moment, you've lost any hope of achieving your purpose (which is to reach a consensus). Remember: you are in control of you. It's your responsibility to remove yourself from a discussion as soon as you feel that your self-control is being compromised, or that your partner has crossed the line of respecting you. Your approach should be, "I can't talk about this now. Let's take a time out and come back later when we've both cooled down." For the sake of your own safety (and decorum), first say it, then do it . . . regardless of what your partner may say or do. It's your responsibility to diffuse a deteriorating situation; you don't need to wait for permission.

• Stay engaged. Learning to argue within the rules means staying with it until you've reached a conclusion that both of you can live with. Shutting down, giving up, or other passive-aggressive approaches will not achieve your purpose. Passive-aggressive behavior is equally aggressive as active-aggression, and equally as destructive to a relationship. As I mentioned before, so long as both of you are approaching the situation with good will (a necessary ingredient to any discussion), a consensus is achievable, even if the discussion continues over a number of sessions.

These are some of the fundamental rules that can turn otherwise destructive arguments into constructive communication. Undoubtedly, there are others (if you can think of any, please send them to me, and I'll gladly add them to this list). What's most important about them is the fact that if you at least follow these few suggestions, you can exponentially grow your chances of maintaining a healthy, contented and spiritually-centered midlife transition in all three areas of concern: your career, your relationship(s) and your own sense of personal well-being.

H. Les Brown, MA, CFCC

Copyright © 2009 H. Les Brown

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Last Thursday night’s guest on my internet radio program was relationship expert, Kathleen Sims, and she talked about the sorts of things that go to make up a successful relationship, especially at midlife. She was very willing to go beyond the kinds of hype that other relationship gurus seem to be using (the kind of promotion that says, “We guarantee that if you follow our easy 3-step program, your relationship will achieve instant perfection!”). We talked about how, as relationships mature, the challenges actually deepen.

In this context, she revealed a startling bit of personal experience: as part of the mentoring that she provides to couples, she has several times offered workshops on communication. Remarkably, she has had little success convincing people to attend. Both she and I have had similar experiences: in general, people seems reluctant to handle the basic fundamental things that are required to create the life that they want. This can be a devastating deficiency at midlife: failing to take care of yourself properly can catapult you into a crisis situation that has the potential to destroy your career, your relationship(s) and/or your health unnecessarily. So . . . can we talk?

Communication forms the very essence of any relationship. Of course we’ll have many relatives (face it: we’re stuck with them) in our lives, but that doesn’t mean that we will have a relationship with them. They’re like many of the items in our safe deposit box: we have to keep them, but we don’t need to deal with them. Some people (falsely) assume that, just because you’re married to someone, you necessarily have a relationship with him or her. When imagining that you have a relationship with someone else, it’s as though you imagine, in Kathleen’s inspired terms, that birth or marriage or civil union has merged the two of you into a sort of conglomerate. If you imagine yourself as a circle and your relationship-partner (by birth or in law) as a second circle, you may think that your relationship causes the circles to merge. I have to agree with Kathleen that, in fact, they do not. Instead, there’s a third circle that represents your relationship, and it ‘belongs’ to neither one of you, but to both of you.

That third circle that we call ‘relationship’ is not natural, it’s created and sustained by the decisions and actions that both of you take. Those decisions and actions determine whether or not there will be communication. Here’s the simple ‘bottom line’: if there’s no communication, there’s no relationship regardless whether you’re parent-child, siblings, life partners, or just friends. You can’t be in a relationship by default. You’re either working at it (by continually learning to communicate and practicing what you’ve learned), or it doesn’t exist at all. You don’t have to have a court order to ‘divorce’ your husband, wife, partner, father, mother, sibling, partner, friend; all you need to do to have an effective divorce is to stop talking about what’s really important to you.

As usual in this midlife ‘game’, men have a tougher time at this than women do, and in both directions: we haven’t been raised to share our deeper thoughts and feelings, nor have we been taught the skills of active, empathetic listening. We too often replace real understanding and empathy — real communication — with the ‘right answers’: “Yes, dear,” or “OK,” or “Yup . . . understood.” There are so many nice and agreeable responses that we men can make that feign listening. We use them in our work situations all the time. They’re empathy surrogates: they’re meant to make it appear that we’re doing what we know we’re not: listening. We know the difference. We man know when we’re really telling you the truth; and very often it scares us to death!

Midlife can’t be successfully navigated without fully engaging in the never-ending struggle to learn to communicate more effectively. It means learning to tell you who I am and what’s going on with me. It also means listening to you at a level that goes far beyond your words: recognizing that, for example, when you’re upset, it’s about you and not about me. It’s a life-long task to learn to extract the meaning from the words, especially when that meaning  has little to do with what the words mean. The task very often involves listening with the heart and blocking out the head — particularly in very intimate relationships.

You may be saying, “I don’t need to learn how to communicate! After all, I’ve been doing it since before I learned to talk!” Or do you? Too often, our fear and our pride keep us away from working on the ‘basics’, as though learning to communicate with others was like learning to feed yourself: once you’ve got it, you’ve got it. That attitude leaves many people foundering with a childish skill level in adult situations. We feel like those we most need to have a relationship with “just don’t understand us,” whereas it’s most often we who are unable to tell them what we need or even what’s going on with us. People who love us very often don’t understand because we’re incapable of telling telling them what they need to know. In relationships, as in every other facet of life — particularly in the midlife transition — it’s much easier for us to blame others for not ‘getting’ us than it is for us to do the hard work necessary to learn how to tell them what we need for them to know.

Midlife severely affects three areas of your life: 1) your career, 2) your relationships, and 3) your health and well-being. If any one of those areas isn’t working for you right now, you need to take a deeper look at yourself. Pointing fingers at others will do nothing to get you out of whatever situation you find yourself in. You alone are responsible for your relationships. What do you need to do — to change — to make these things work. Dumping them should be a resort taken only when it makes no sense to continue (usually because the other person in the relationship has decided not to do the work to maintain his or her part of the relationship).

One final note about relationships: don’t imagine that having a deep and vital relationship means that things will always go smoothly between you. They won’t. Growth only comes from meeting (and grappling with) challenges and obstacles. A ‘relationship’ that has no friction or disagreements is most often that way because it lacks real intimacy. In fact, I’d be willing to go out on a limb here and say that the more vital and intimate a relationship is, the more challenging the struggles that ensue.  Likewise, the more difficult the midlife transition from adulthood to maturity proves to be, the richer and fuller the maturity will become. Can we talk? Hang in there: don’t quit before the miracle happens!

H. Les Brown, MA, CFCC

Copyright © 2009 H. Les Brown

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Of course, leaving an abusive relationship is always a reasonable option when it's become unbearable or other alternatives have been exhausted. Relationships are very precious things (especially when they create new families), and nobody would recommend tossing them away lightly. We always want to give them the benefit of the doubt; but, when the doubt has been worn out, or when health and safety may be compromised, there's no question that discretion is always the better part of valor. At the same time, doesn't it seem as though many relationships end because the partners come to an impasse and they simply become too worn out to pursue them any farther? Sometimes people simply forget that 'this, too, shall pass' and they bail out too soon — only to regret it later on.

For those who have gotten themselves enmeshed in the emotional morass of the midlife transition and remain unaware of the dynamics of this volatile period of life (both men and women), the prospects for their relationships, even after twenty or thirty years together, may seem hopeless. He thinks that she's constantly on his case and has turned against him; she thinks he's bored and doesn't find her attractive and he's pulled back from her emotionally, refusing even to meet her half-way. Sound familiar? Yet, the reality of the situation has escaped both of them. He can't accurately pinpoint the origins of his restlessness, irritability, and discontent. He blames her for his unhappiness, whereas it's only a natural reaction he's having to the physical, emotional, and spiritual changes that midlife has brought about in him. She, on the other hand, (probably as unaware as he is of the inner changes he's going through) thinks that she must be doing something wrong; so she tries even harder to reconnect to that precious relationship that she feels is slipping away from her. It really doesn't help her, either, that, whenever they do talk about what's going on, he's blaming her for everything. As you probably know, if someone you trust repeats the same falsehood over and over again, you start to doubt your own perceptions. 'It's black! It's black! It's black!' you hear so many times that, eventually, you start seeing shades of gray in what you know deep down is really white.

It's a great deal easier to mend a damaged relationship than to resurrect one that's been bludgeoned to death by doubts and recriminations. Time, as they say, is of the essence. So is the willingness to fight for something that both of you value. Both of you have a great deal at stake above and beyond the value of the relationship itself. If you're a woman in this situation, you risk a proportionately greater dose of emotional pain and suffering as you watch helplessly as your marriage and family falls apart. You feel more, not because the man isn't hurting, but because you've been trying so hard. The man has the tougher role in this scenario, though, because he tends to remain oblivious to what's going on inside him, to blame his partner for the difficulty, and to use anger as his primary tool for dealing with a situation he doesn't really understand. His role is tougher because he has very likely steeled himself against seeing the facts for what they are and uses his anger to block any true realization of what he's losing on an emotional level. He's been taught to 'play through the pain,' so he lacks the necessary incentives to question either his perceptions of the situation or his response to it. In many instances, by the time he wakes up to the damage he's suffered emotionally, his partner as written him off and her trust and affection is gone.

What's the answer? First, both of you have to value your relationship enough to fight for it. Second, both of you need either to learn to communicate with one another, or to put your communication skills to work at maximum intensity. Talk, talk, talk, and, when you're too tired to go on, talk some more. Third, learn to understand what's going on: why is he behaving this way? what does she want of me? Then learn what it means to 'fight fair' and do it. Fourth, get over yourselves, practice some real humility, set your pride aside, and get some help — either as individuals or as a couple. Forget about trying to figure this whole thing out all by yourself. Chances are, you don't know all the answers because you're probably asking the wrong questions. Furthermore, there's too much at stake in the loss of your relationship to take a chance on your re-inventing the wheel without some serious blunders. You absolutely need to rely on others' wisdom and experience to get you through. However, keep a healthy skepticism: beware of 'friends' who jump to conclusions and tell you to dump your partner (often because that's what they did, and they feel guilty about it). Remember: you're hardly the first couple on earth to have gone through this. Patience, trust and good will can lead you both through this midlife dance without stumbling; and the next dance may very well be a warm and intimate waltz.

H. Les Brown, MA, CFCC

Copyright © 2008 H. Les Brown

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