I think I have an idea what you mean when you say this but would you mind explaining further? I am curious about your thoughts.

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I think I have an idea what you mean when you say this but would you mind explaining further? I am curious about your thoughts.

I’ll try to, and thanks for asking, Tiggy. I must admit up-front, though, that these are still concepts that I am struggling with. They’re difficult for me to fully internalize and express, and in trying to use them here, part of what I’m trying to do is fully understand them.

The things that I’ve been talking about arise from David Schnarch’s work, which I’ve read and re-read in Passionate Marriage. I have also been doing some reading on line, and will quote from that stuff here (it’s easier than typing things by hand).

So. What’s holding onto your Self mean? I’m going to quote from Schnarch, because he’s funny and pointed and entirely willing to take on the hard stuff in ways that I’m not very good at, verbally, yet.

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Differentiation is about holding onto yourself enough that you can begin to recognize the impact you're having on other people. It's not me-ism. But you've got to hold onto yourself to be able to do that. Weak people can't do that—the people who are dependent on each other's validation for their acceptance or anxiety regulation.

Everybody is afraid of something. Everybody is afraid to stand up. Everybody is afraid to be found lacking. Everybody is afraid that, if you really know them you won't love them. But you have to look and speak beyond that, where the question is no longer 'are you afraid?" It's a given that you are afraid. Now the question is, 'What will you do?"

I used to say, “Intelligent life takes a stand,” which is a quote from the wonderful story (don’t see the movie, read the book) Enemy Mine. I say holding onto your Self because the “intelligent life” thing can be taken as fighting, where really, what I mean is solidity.

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There's a lot more to marriage than communication and how men and women communicate differently. A much greater cause of problems is our similarities--our dependence and insistence on getting a positive self-reflection from someone else, and our inability to soothe our own anxieties. The problem is not how "distant" we are. It's that we're emotional Siamese twins, "fused at the hip" through our dependence on our partner's validation.

Holding onto your Self, when you’re emotionally fused, means that all of a sudden your partner feels controlled. A very common theme in the relationships we see, where there is much screeching about “you’re trying to control me!” and “you’re pressuring me” and “I need space!!!” All of which is basically, “You’re making my world uncomfortable and I can’t soothe myself so YOU have to stop it immediately!”

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Differentiation is a natural process in committed relationships that involves developing more of a self while growing closer to your partner. Men often sacrifice their relationship to hold onto their sense of self. Women often sacrifice their sense of self to stabilize their relationship. Differentiation is about having it both ways: having a stronger sense of self and a stronger relationship.

the important part here is that it’s BOTH. Develop your sense of self AND be intimate with your partner. That’s really really hard.

Truly.

Don’t believe me? Try Schnarch’s idea of having sex with your eyes open – and looking deeply into your partner’s eyes. Go ahead. Try it. See if you can manage it. (It took me and HoFS months. And I wouldn’t go back for the world.)

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Intimacy is about letting yourself really be known, including parts that you or your partner don't like. But it's not just about letting "warts" be known. It often involves showing strengths you've been hiding, too.

Our strengths scare the bejeezus out of us, often because we either didn’t know they were there, or because our mothers thwacked us when we displayed them (in wholly inappropriate ways) at the age of two.

Differentiation

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"involves balancing two basic life forces: the drive for individuality and the drive for togetherness. Individuality propels us to follow our own directives, to be on our own, to create a unique identify. Togetherness pushes us to follow the directives of others, to be part of the group. When these two life forces for individuality and togetherness are expressed in balanced, healthy ways, the result is a meaningful relationship that doesn't deteriorate into emotional fusion." (Schnarch, 1998, p. 55)

More from Schnarch:

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If you want to really put people up against the wall, you talk to the best in them … how many of you think that people deserve their feelings? It's their feelings. And if somebody is going to have to suffer with those feelings it ought to be them. Other people shouldn't have to suffer with your feelings, right? They're your feelings. So instead of expecting other people to take care of your feelings, if you're the only one that's going to suffer with your feelings, fine.

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[Growth] takes something very powerful. And that's the wonderful thing about love relationships. Love relationships take your limitations and stuff them right up your nose, in a situation that you can't easily walk away from. What else would make you take yourself on? And so, all of this stuff about you're entitled to your feelings, it's nonsense. Just nonsense. In marriage, you're entitled to your feelings about whether Bush should have won the election in Florida. But the point is, the reason why therapists focus on feelings is because that way nobody has to make hard decisions. But the mistake is, marriage isn't primarily about feelings. Marriage is about making decisions about behavior. So, you're entitled to your feelings, but you're not entitled to act on them in marriage. Do you have kids? Ever want to kill them? … You're not entitled to act on your feelings. For instance, all the people who are focusing on getting clients to talk about their feelings, it's often an attempt to get the low desire partner to have a new set of feelings, and/or talk the high desire partner out of what they want. It doesn't work that way. That's not marriage. Therapists like to focus on the feelings because then they can empathize with everybody. When you start getting into 'What are you going to do?" you're walking people into the reality that marriage usually only gives you the choice of which anxiety you're going to accept. Therapists often promote the idea that people have to right to avoid sex while they're nervous. We make the point, 'No, you don't have to have sex while you're frightened. Instead, you can have a divorce while you are frightened.’

This isn’t really an answer, just a random set of quotes without even giving good references. I'm sorry about that. I’ve been struggling all day with how to deal with another problem in my life instead of answering the fun theory question. But it’s a start until I can do better.

Very interesting. I have always wanted to read his book and even have it here somewhere. I just have not had the time with school these last few years.

I find the part about feelings very intriguing. In the realm of parenting, I have often thought that people tend to worry way too much about hurting the children's feelings.

As a young parent I cared about my children's happiness - of course. I cared much more though about whether they were moral, respectful and safe. So, yup, I hurt their feelings a lot - as many parents do. My 6 year old told me the other day that I wasn't "very nice, not nice at all"...because it was time to turn off the TV.

Well, this is interesting and intrigues me to go look for that book and put it on the top of the summer-reading pile.

Thank you.
Tiggy

J, just want you to know I am still chewing on what you shared so generously. It can take me awhile sometimes to digest everything.

Another thought I had this morning is about actions and wants. There have been many times where I stated that I wanted to have a certain type of relationship, lets say a loving, respectful one for now. Then my actions work towards the complete opposite of stated goal. Instead of acting loving or respectful I have gotten demanding, blaming and self-righteous. How illogical. I think back on it now and wonder how I ever justified it, that doing those things would engender anything but a tense relationship. Quite the opposite of loving or respectful.

I've found Schnarch's book to be an excellent antidote to some of the problems you see in other books. None are perfect, of course, and Schnarch may lean too far in the direction of taking care of yourself versus focusing on taking care of your spouse. Both are necessary for a marriage to work, of course, so I like the combination of his work with work that focuses more on taking care of your spouse.

One thing Schnarch talks about is how infants are actually much more resilient and independent than we give them credit for. They're actually out of synch with their primary caregiver something like 2/3 of the time -- and only half of that time to they manage to re-sync with the primary caregiver. The other third of the time, they're on their own and manage to self-soothe most of the time even then.

Schnarch notes that when we become adults involved in intimate relationships, we sometimes expect that our spouses will take care of all our emotional needs, which is somewhat silly considering that not even infants need that level of care, and adults are (hopefully) more able to do self-care than infants.

Obviously life is muuuuuch better with a significant amount of care from your spouse, but I still like the strong reminders that adults can and should take care of themselves very well indeed. It prevents me from leaning too hard on HoFS in my own life, and here it helps me focus on the people who actually come to post, rather than their spouses.

I think saying you want a loving, respectful relationship is an excellent first step. And yes, you have to -be- loving and respectful for that to actually be in your relationship. It doesn't mean your relationship will be loving and respectful; your partner would have to choose that for your relationship as well. But if you don't choose it, you really can't get there! Funny how people work, isn't it? For me, I want a close, connected relationship. Except that then I wander off into my own disconnected, distant world and have to work my way back to something closer to what I actually want.

It really is an amazingly thought-provoking book. I'm also not focusing, for this discussion, on most of the concepts in his book, which involve the application of all these things to the sexual part of marriage. That part is even more interesting.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Just J_SYMC,

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Men often sacrifice their relationship to hold onto their sense of self. Women often sacrifice their sense of self to stabilize their relationship.

Whoa.

Too bad I couldn't have known back then what I know now.

Then again, what else could have been powerful enough to force me to face myself?

Life......a big huge mystery.......amazing and scary and amazing (and scary).

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Whoa.

Too bad I couldn't have known back then what I know now.

Then again, what else could have been powerful enough to force me to face myself?

Yoda.