Whose responsible for whose feelings?

In some circles you’ll hear ‘I am not responsible for how you feel’.

In a relationship we are straddling the truth that ‘how I feel and react is my business and says more about me than you and is my responsibility to take care of’ AND  ‘the things that you do or don’t do, say or don’t say have an impact on me’.

Let’s look at how in relationship, we take responsibility for our own wellbeing (emotions and actions) and own our impact on our partner (others).  To cut off and deny that we have an impact on those around us, is to walk around with one eye shut.  Leaving us likely to hurt ourselves or others unwittingly.  Being present and caring in regard to another’s feelings and yet not distorting ourselves by taking responsibility for another’s feelings – is an art.

Recognising and handling our interconnectedness is central to relationship in which we feel safe, secure, loved and free to be ourselves. This is especially so when there is conflict or friction.  Jumping in and taking responsibility for each others feelings and actions can be suffocating and exhausting, leading to resentment.

Our feelings arise and are coded into behaviour.  Hopefully we can express ourselves clearly and in a way that support understanding, closeness and growth.  On the other hand if we haven’t yet understood our reaction,  are overcome by the feelings or  are concerned with not causing further disconnection – we may not actually say what we want or need.  Leaving it up to our behaviour to get the message across!

What happens instead might be a combination of pulling away, withdrawing, somehow turning away toward work, children etc.  Or we might express anger, irritation, nagging, criticizing or blaming, about something that is quite unrelated.

It is important to decode the messages from these behaviours either by yourselves or with some help, rather than to switch off and push them back on to the one having a reaction, or dump them on the other person.

Otherwise these unclear responses are where we can get tangled and stuck.

To get clear and hold both care and responsibility appropriately in a conflict try to:

• Slow the pace right down
• Ask the other with curiosity, what is the actual, specific thing that has upset them?
• What did that mean to them when this happened?
• And how do they feel right now?
• How would they ideally like things to be?
• Ask yourself honestly – how have I contributed to this?
• What do I want to say or do now?

Seek first to understand, then to be understood (St. Francis) is a handy maxim.  The intent behind the work of Marshall Rosenberg, NVC is to give us a guiding framework for taking responsibility for our feelings and holding those around us with care and connectedness.  You can learn how to do this with me in the workshop Now Connect: Creating Loving Connections. Register 0438 364 636

When you want to help

There are times when there is someone I know and I want to help them.  That’s a tricky place to be in. Do you have  a partner (or a family member)  who is in some sort of  emotional pain, that seems to not be directly to do with you?  Perhaps they are feeling upset, depressed, angry, anxious by work, health, school?

Perhaps you have ideas about what they could do in order to improve their lot.  Eat better, exercise more, change their job, change their friends, go to a therapist.  Ideally you want to fix things for them, only you can’t.  It seems you are powerless.

Making a meaningful contribution is the essence of what we want to do for those we love. There is however one respect in which you’re not powerless.  There is one thing you can address directly that can have a wide ranging positive effect.

What is it?  You can do all that you can to make your relationship with this person as clean, clear, loving, healthy and blame free as possible.  In other words, do all that you can to raise the quality of your relationship with them.

• Spring clean and make as clean, fearless and loving as possible your relationship with them.
• Do what you can to ensure your relationship is not a contributing factor to their depression, anxiety etc.
• Your wellbeing is a positive contribution – so raise the attention and quality of care you give yourself

If there is one ‘thing’ you can control it is your choices.  If you are struggling with gathering up your own focus and actions in a constructive direction then – it can be good to turn around and take care of your own need for support in doing this.

Creative relationships

Ever have a really good look at how anger effects your relationship?

When someone is angry, to some degree there are usually thoughts about “I am right, better than, have the answer.” “Or they shouldn’t/ should …”.  Or similar … this thinking  blocks creativity and it often blocks understanding and effective action.

Most of us do get annoyed, irritated or straight out angry at times.  And this isn’t necessarily a bad thing unless we don’t know how to handle it and create distress in our relationship and those around us.

Anger includes everything from irritation to annoyance in my view.  These are shades of the same kind of thinking and emotion. And I think all traces of anger are too valuable to ignore.

So it’s also important in my view to recognise that anger doesn’t always involve loud and shouting at each other.  It can display itself in cool disinterest and withdrawal too.

Whatever way you currently ‘hold/ express’ anger, the main thing is to  go beyond it! The place to go is down underneath it – picture subterranean streams of life and feeling flowing beneath the hard shield anger supports.  That’s where you want to head.  Down there is the juice that can feed your relationship.  Up at the irritation, sullen smouldering resistance or outright anger it is hard to get hold of something that will really shift you forward.

How? To go beyond the initial flush of anger find your breath, however you like to do this.  Maybe you do yoga, walking, running, sit quietly.  Breathe and centre.  Breathe and settle.

Note: Don’t choose activities to distract yourself from the anger and then brush it aside.  Rather choose something that helps you calm and reflect, not go and act on the initial burst of anger.

In the quietness of your breath, descend underneath anger and discover the real feeling layer.  What feelings are here? Sadness, anxiety, distress, grief? Under these deeper more informative feelings, is a stream of wisdom and information that is trying to help you move forward, to open up and grow, find a new perspective.  So, what are you now aware of? What is critically important to you? Connection? Anger is often a protest about disconnection.  Security and safety?  What’s  this turmoil really about?

In our anger we don’t have to go to the truth of what is in our heart.  So sometimes we resist calming down and cutting through to this deeper layer. Perhaps because we have already decided what the next step would be and we don’t like that.  Often though, once you really get down to it, a whole new vista opens up.  Which can be quite different to what you expected.

So be ready to receive a new perspective when you get in the flow of this quieter energy within.  Then approach the issue or person that sparked your anger in a way from clarity, calmness with the intention to connect and understand each other.

warmly