Oh WOW!

Dallas County Citizens Better Do Something to Help Our Kids

2008-10-01T16:35:05.229-05:00

Once again the kids lose!

The Superintendent of the DISD (Dallas County Independent School District), Michael Hinojosa, has recommend that the district handle the budget shortfall by cutting HALF of the Counselor positions!

Now, I know that School Counselors don’t get to do much real counseling as it is, given the administrative work they have been assigned, but this is a often child’s only hope for an adult to reach out to if they are in trouble. What kind of future will the kids of DISD have if there are not enough counselors for them to turn to?

What School Counselors Do

School counselors help make plans for kids with all kinds of problems, emotional, educational and vocational. Without them to help kids find their path, who is going to take up the slack? The teachers? The administrators? I don’t think so!!

I want to get angry and blame the school district. I know they have had their share of corruption and the normal bureaucracy struggles. But this is absurd. Cut back on football for God’s sake. Now, don’t get me wrong I think sports are important, especially team sports, but to build huge stadiums like we do here in Texas when they are laying off counselors to make up for the slake is absurd. I don’t know that they are doing that in DISD but I do know there are BOUND to be more humane things to do to solve this problem than to kick out the Counselors.

Who is a kid to turn to???

When my kids needed help with anything in school, they turned to their counselors to help with career choices, to deal with teachers or administrators they had clashes with, etc. But for kids with no real home life, school Counselors become their only real refuge. They help them find all kinds of resources they could not find otherwise. Does the superintendent not get it that he will suddenly see a spike in drug use, in suicide, in violence and school drop out rates if he does this ridiculous thing? The violence rate in Dallas County will undoubtedly go up, the truancy rate will go up, and our courts will have to deal with the kids the School Counselors could have helped long, long before the courts got involved.

Where is our humanity???

If you live in Dallas County it is in your best interest whether you have children or not to weigh in on this issue. Call the board and complain, send a barrage of emails, go down there in person and tell them to get their head out of their rear end and do something different about the budget crisis.

Weigh in with me, too.

I’d like to hear if you are going to do something! Comment below.

Enemies a Love Story

2008-09-23T20:39:31.515-05:00

Stay or Go?

That’s the question addressed in the series of short stories about women struggling in a bad relationships. Each of these stories have different women, different relationship issues, and different outcomes. What is the red threat that holds these stories together?

I guess O thought it was the fact that these women all struggled to find themselves and to muster the courage to do what was right for them, whether it be addressing problems head on and fixing the relationship or leaving.

Egocentric positions

The interesting thing to me is how much egocentrism existed in each of these articles. Each woman felt they were alone in their marriage, and the decision was up to them. Each flailed about on their own with the decision instead of recognizing the issue as being about a lack of intimacy that was present in the marriage, not just the man.

My own choices

I remember making similar choices twice before in my life. My first to marriages were stuck in a battle for each of our survival and neither of us fared well in the process. Growth as an individual is impossible if the marriage is not growing too, but growth of the individual is magnified if growth is happening in the marriage.

Making unilateral decisions every day

The funny thing is that in unhealthy relationships we make unilateral decisions about the marriage every day, sometimes every minute. How do we do that? We do that by becoming reactive to our partner and putting up barriers to hold them away from us emotionally. Sometimes it’s all we can muster. I get that. I lived that. But if we are to push for something more than just mere survival we have to be more compassionate.

What compassion really means

Being compassionate means that we stop seeing our partner as the enemy, the “bad guy”, the “wrong” one. It means we accept that all of us are not perfect, including us. When we do that there is a chance of really experiencing closeness, and perhaps even great sex. It changes everything!

What do you think?

Are there times when you just have to accept that your partner is in the wrong and keep your protective boundaries up? Comment below.

Sarah Palin, Hilary Clinton - Like-able Candidates Need Only Apply

2008-09-16T21:26:16.453-05:00

The relatable factor

It has been said of Sarah Palin that women relate to her. She is pretty, strong, and hard headed. She has a lot of qualities that we’d like our mom’s to have, and that we would like to be ourselves: confident, sure of our words, and unapologetic for our beliefs and public behaviors. She is a wife, a mother with five children and a job.

Hilary Clinton only had one child and her life was her work. They have made very different choices, and very different perceptions by the pubic.

Working moms, the media would have us believe, relate with a mom who shoots wolves from a helicopter and risks our child’s health by flying eight hours across the country after our water broke. Maybe she is more relatable and personable than Hilary.

Unfair standards

She is being judged by perhaps unfair standards, as any woman running for public office still is today. She is expected to as the song says “bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan” and still look gorgeous in the process. She does all of that. And she isn’t afraid to stand up for what she believes in either.

I think it is less that we relate with her than that we would like to be like her. Hilary seemed so severe and took the second seat next to her oh-so-charming husband. How many of us even know what Palin’s husband looks like? We like the idea that we could be all of those things and still be liked. Hilary Clinton struggled to do all of those things and still be liked. A lot of people ended up liking her, but it didn’t come easily to her. She never was gorgeous and a super mom in the way of Sarah Palin.

Good guys and bad guys

When we are in our usual mode of trying to decide who is the “good guy” and who is the “bad guy” it’s easy to confuse likable with “good”. It’s easy to confuse “like me” with “good” and “not like me” with “bad”. We all feel more comfortable with these easy categories. When we can sort people out by simple categories and selecting “good” and “bad” based on them. Funny thing is, I can understand this because it is how our brains work. But that doesn’t make for rational judgments based on the things that really matter.

The cute guy in class

I remember when I was a teen falling for the cutest guy in my class. He was funny, personable and had the best bone structure. I flushed every time he came near and longed for his attention. My entire perception of his desirability was based on how he appeared. He was in the “good” category. He ended up dropping out from ninth grade and spending, last I heard, five years in the federal penitentiary for drug dealing.

Choosing with a different part of our brain

While our primitive survival instincts will have us pick and sort based on these simple groupings… they don’t really help us in our modern world. Choosing a candidate for President of these United States must be done based on something beyond are they “like me” or not. Granted that is our instinct. But should instincts prevail in our choices? Or should we pick based on something out of our more evolved, cognitive mind?

Being able to choose to do anything based on our more evolved, higher brain functions seems imperative to me as a human being, and even more so as a citizen of a free country with a right to vote. We have a responsibility to use our choices wisely and with our more evolved brain. It changes everything.

How it seems to me

We must pick our candidate based on what they show us about what they are capable of doing and being, not just whether they are perceived as being a “good guy” “like me” or not.

What do you think?

Should we vote based on or emotional reactions? Are these valid points or am I off base? Let me know. Comment below.

Clueless Men and Unsatisfied Wives

2008-09-09T16:42:31.439-05:00

For the past couple of years I’ve been writing articles for Dan and Jennifer of the askdanandjennifer.com website. Lucky for me they live close by and Mike and I have had dinner with them a couple of times and I now consider them to be friends. They are a great, generous, and hardworking couple of kids. I’m proud to know them. They have an interesting website but – be warned they deal with a lot of sexual material. I personally think this is good thing because they answer a lot of people’s questions about things that are hard to get good answers about.

The Forum Questions

In the past couple of months I’ve been answering a lot of their forum questions – in fact I’ve been doing more of that then writing articles. It’s as fascinating thing to do because it gets to the hear of what intimacy means to people. Of course, sex and intimacy are not the same thing – but to most people they are deeply connected.

So many of us seem to have trouble with intimacy and sex simply because we are stuck in the fear based reactions of the Cycle of Egocentrism. Our old brain reactivity kicks in and we loose sight of ourselves and our partner.

Not so silly message

I watched a silly movie with my daughter yesterday, “Waitress”. It had the guy from “Serenity” (Nathan Fillion) in it so my daughter wanted to watch it. It was not all that well written and had a seriously slow pace, but it was cute. Two things struck me about this movie though. The first is that the waitress’s husband, Earl, (played by Jeremy Sisto) was painted as being a “bad husband” from the beginning of the film. The waitress, played by Keri Russell, never had one bit of empathy for him. Now, I’ll concede he was a painfully difficult person; he was somewhat abusive and controlling. But as the movie progressed it became clear he was also in a lot of pain, and horribly incapable of knowing how to connect with his beautiful, uncommunicative wife. When the waitress did connect with someone it was with a married man (Nathan Fillion) who was also her OB-GYN. This relationship contrasted with that of her marriage by showing her new lover as being emotionally caring, and sensitive to her feelings. During the narration she did she stated that she realized how great it felt to have someone really listen to her like what she felt and thought mattered to them. Obviously her husband didn’t have that gift.

Clueless men and dissatisfied wives

I bring this movie up because it reminded me so much of some of the questions sent in to the forum on Dan and Jennifer’s website. Clueless men asking why their wives have no interest in sex anymore and dissatisfied wives seeking out connections with other men because their own husbands don’t know how to connect with them emotionally.

“Bad guys”

Now, I realize how I just framed things makes it look like it’s the guys fault for not being emotionally available. The truth is that it’s not their fault, and it’s not entirely about them not being able. Men are frequently raised to hold all sign of emotions inside and are not given a vocabulary with which to express their feelings. They are not supposed to need any kind of affection or nurturing from anyone past about the age of three. Then we marry them and suddenly they are expected to know how to give and receive nurturing and to talk about feelings; and if they don’t they are a “bad husband”.

When we put people in categories of “bad” and “good” were are limiting them – and ourselves – as human beings. And it absolves us of any responsibility for what occurs when we label someone else as the “bad” one.

My “bad guys”

I did this during my first two marriages. I was caught up in seeing how “bad” my husbands were at being husbands. I believed I was the innocent victim wanting intimacy with men who were incapable of expressing it. I had no desire for sex with them because I didn’t feel the least bit connected with them. And that, I believed, was because of them.

What I know now is that they and I came into the marriage with baggage from our pasts. We all do. And I was no more capable of intimacy than they were. I had to learn how to be empathetic for them, and for myself, in order to allow myself to experience the intimacy I so desperately wanted. To do that I had to let go of the belief in “good” and “bad” guys. Getting out of what I call the Cycle of Egocentrism changes everything.

Is there a “bad guy” in your life?

Tell me what you think? Comment below.

The Struggle to Say What You Want

2008-09-04T15:53:17.637-05:00

O Magazine published an article in September about the difficulties women have with saying what they want. It was a silly, fun article with references to words I don’t believe are really words (like “wanty”) but it hit home.

We have all been bred to keep what we really want to ourselves. It’s what I would call a “Victim” reaction to having desires because one sure way to never get what you want is to never let anyone know what it is you really do want. But how many of us men or women, have spent most of our lives trying to guess what others want and how to avoid saying what we want?

Hiding starts early

Case in point my own desire, from an early age, to play the piano. I guess I never came out and told anyone but I know that any time I got near I played on it. If the other kids were playing outside, eating ice cream, or any other fun activity - if there was a piano around, I was playing it instead. So I was amazed when my mother said she never knew I wanted to play.

My own inability to say what I want has shaped my life in many ways. I am not sure how I learned the lesson, but I obviously did.

Emotions make it harder

Now, don’t get me wrong its not that I can never say what I want, because that is not true. I have learned to ask for what I want from waiters, cashiers, and other service people. I can even ask my friends to do things with me. But, if it is something that has some kind of emotional weight, it has not always been easy.

Women get the impression you are pushy if you make it clear what you want and don’t back down at the first sign of dissent. We get labeled as “bitchy” if we insist on getting what we want. Of course, men, in similar situations would be considered “strong”. But I don’t think men are any better, over all than women at asking for what they really want. Emotional things, things that would seem to make them “weak” are strictly forbidden for men to ask.

Divorce and truth telling

It’s no wonder our divorce rate is so high. Because if we remain in a place of being unable to communicate what we want and need from our partners we are stuck in the helpless, Victim, position with no hope of escape. Unless of course our partner is astute enough to glean what it is we want from our manipulative behaviors. Of course, hiding our sexual reality has become such a commonplace thing that according to a Lavalife survey even 53% of men fake orgasms (82% of women do).

Rescuers often can figure out what their partners want, but we don’t always get it exactly right. Guess work is like that, sometimes you win and sometimes you don’t.

Taking ownership of our wants and needs is the only hope we have of really getting what we want instead of some close approximation. Our partner’s may be pretty good, but nobody can always guess right.

Do you know what you want?

Someone commented on the O Magazine article that she had not addressed the whole issue because she hadn’t addressed how you even KNOW what it is you want. A lot of us are so out of touch with ourselves, our bodies and our emotions that we have no clue what we want. That makes it even tougher to ask doesn’t it?

Learning to connect with our bodies and emotions is the first step in being able to identify what we want and need. I love the series Mad Men on AMC. It portrays the social environment that set us up to never say what we want or know what it is we need. My favorite characters are the mysterious Dan Draper and his wife Betty. Dan (not his real name but, that’s the identity he assumed) doesn’t have a clue what he feels and is constantly in search of something that will make him feel something. Betty, his sweet, picturesque wife is equally clueless because she is not supposed to need or want anything other than the house and home that Dan provides her. Betty reminds me of my own mother during that period, dressing up to look the part, but always a bit out of place.

Isn’t that how we all feel when we deny ourselves awareness of what we want and need? Learning connect with our bodies and emotions and then being courageous enough to speak our truths changes everything.

What are you not saying?

Almost everyone hold things back from their partners. Do you? What do you not like to say? Do you tell your friends what you do and don’t want? Your family? I’d love to hear. Comment below.

McCain? Palin? Obama? Biden? Whose the Good Guy?

2008-09-02T16:21:11.169-05:00

Sorting out a political choice

Sorting out a political choice is confusing today – perhaps more than ever. Computer aided technology has helped get more and more clear about exactly what America wants. What we want is a centrist candidate with good morals who can be trusted to uphold the American Constitution and who will provide a solid front to foreign officials. Each party has their slant on what exactly that means. To the traditional Republican it means having someone who is for Gun’s rights and against abortion and gay marriage. To a Democrat it means someone who is willing to make social change happen at the same time managing to allow more freedoms to the individual.

“Good Guys” versus “Bad Guys”

But inside all of it the process seems to be about figuring out who is the “Good Guy” and who is the “Bad Guy”.

McCain’s choice of Palin as his running mate managed to put him more in the “Good Guy” column to a lot of women voters. Thus turning him in to a “Good Guy” for women voters looking for an avenue for women to gain access to the Oval Office.

Obama gets to be the “Good Guy” for all those people of color who have never made it to the Oval office, too. Of course, his naming Biden as his running mate made him the “Good Guy” to all those Jewish citizens who have never made it to the Oval Office either.

This race seems to be as much about who can be the best “Good Guy” for the most discriminated group as anything else. Even McCain’s age is a factor in that he will be one of the oldest presidential candidates (Reagan was 73 when he ran). Seniors are yet another disenfranchised group. Older people will see him as the poster child for growing older and still fully participating in life and the world.

As the race for the 2008 election continues we will undoubtedly hear some quickly thrown together stories about why each candidate is not really the “Good Guy” and in fact, is the “Bad Guy” we all fear.

For McCain, the issue already (pardon the pun) heating up, is the issue of his temper. He has quite a quick fuse and there are 40 videos of his temper flaring that have been viewed more than a million times.

For Obama there is the ridiculous claim that he is a Muslim “fundamentalist”. Just calling him a Muslim puts him into the “Bad Guy” category for many ignorant voters thinking that Muslim equates with terrorism. (The Muslim faith has many of the same basic tenets as the Christian faith and neither are proponents of murder and terror).

What is behind this simplification?

So what is up with this need to find a “Good Guy” or a “Bad Guy” all the time? I think its part of how our brains are wired. We have to assess a potential threat with the knowledge of what is “Good” and what is “Bad” so that we can quickly determine the right course of action. It’s a primitive response that comes from our old brain, the part of our brain that is similar in structure to reptiles. The impulse is: if it’s a threat to us it is “Bad” if it is safe it is “Good”. So we view threats this way. Swing voters go back and forth looking to figure out who is this weeks “Good Guy” and “Bad Guy”. The “Swift Boaters” of the last election were able to sway this group to win the election for George Bush. Now, I wasn’t a big Kerry fan, but now who is the “Bad Guy”?

The important take-away

The important thing I hope you will take away from this tirade is that simply allowing or primitive reactions and looking for the simple “Good Guy” versus “Bad Guy” decision making process can get us all in a world of mess. (Look what happened the last time!) We need to use our higher brain functions, put on our thinking caps and make decisions based on the real issues and not whether one is perceived at this moment in history as a “Good Guy” or a “Bad Guy” in whatever category we are interested. Getting out of the black and white (no political reference intended) changes everything!

It's an illusion!

The “Good Guy, Bad Guy” image is all illusion anyway, that should be clear by now, manipulated by the media and each man’s political campaign. Dig deeper, discover for yourself what makes each of these clearly GOOD men tick. Choose based on whether you fundamentally agree with what one of them is saying they believe, and how they have VOTED in the past. Look at the things they have done, not just what they say, and make a choice based on how closely they match your values. Don’t allow the media’s appeal to our reptilian brain dictate your thinking. You are smarter than that!

Comments Please!

Let me know how you see it. Have you seen the “Good Guy/Bad Guy” thing happening in other areas? I’d love to hear what you think. Comment below.

Trading Sex for Services is Biology??

2008-08-28T16:02:58.468-05:00

Trading Sex for Jungle Tour

I read this great article today on CNN about how this college student, now a chocolate store owner, convinced a local African to take her into the jungle to live for two weeks. She had been unable to find a paid guide to take her, but this young man liked her looks. She didn’t particularly like his, but she didn’t care. She traded two weeks of sex for two weeks in the jungle. It turned out to be a great deal, she felt it more than worth the price.

The Powerof Sex to Get Things Done

The article goes on to talk about how a lot of women trade sex for services. The classic having sex with your handyman was the most obvious example. Though the article traced these types of trades back to ancient Egypt when Cleopatra “cemented her power” through having sexual relations with Roman rulers.

Biology of the Trade

The final paragraph in the article talks about the whole premise of trading sex for services being driven by biology. Dr. Chris Fariello, director of the Institute for Sex Therapy at the Council for Relationships, a nonprofit relationship-counseling group based in Philadelphia, says a partner who provides more resources -- wealth, shelter, home repairs -- is seen as more attractive and stands to reap more sexual rewards. But until I got to the last line, I didn’t really get why having sex with your handyman was more than just a funny cliché. As Fariello puts it, "I don't get anybody in my office who says, 'My husband sits on the couch all day and eats bonbons, and I want to have sex with him all the time.”

What Does This Say About US?

This made me laugh out loud. But then I thought about what it is really saying. What this is saying is that our pre-programmed biological drive is to have a mate who takes ownership of their life and surroundings – and is capable of doing so. Whether male or female we have to add value to our partner in some form. Men are easier because they have such a strong biological drive for sex, but women, too need a man who adds something to her life. Men have often twisted that to mean (perhaps because of our American cultural emphasis on money) that if they don’t make a lot of money they can’t get a hot wife.

What this article makes clear is that women and men need the same thing - someone who adds value to their life. That could mean money, but then why do so many well-supported women give up married life in order to pursue something else? Obviously money is NOT it! Women want a man who does more that “sits on the couch all day eat(ing) bonbons.” We are biologically driven to find a man willing to take ownership of their life and surroundings. It changes everything. I’ve always said there is nothing sexier than a man standing in front of the sink with a sink full of dirty dishes and his sleeves rolled up. We want a man who is willing to work… Of course, what men want from us is a whole different article.

To be completely honest, that describes me to a T. My first husband was worthless, didn’t even feel that he needed to earn income, much less contribute around the house or with our baby. My second worked hard but contributed nothing to my needs, making our home or caring for our daughters. Now I have married a man who works harder than I do at keeping our home and family together. I’m crazy about him. Who knew it was biology?

What do you think?

Do you ever think you would trade your skill for sex or sex for a skill? I'd love to hear if you have nor have not, and what you think about it.

Primitive Reactivity Prevails in Olsteen Lawsuit

2008-08-07T15:16:36.511-05:00

Who is to blame?

In a what her lawyer refers to as a “silly” case involving Joel Olsteens’ wife, Victoria, a litigious flight attendant has filed charges against Mrs. Olsteen. The flight attendant, Sharon Brown, claims injury after Mrs. Olsteen allegedly pushed her against the bathroom door and elbowed her breast. Mrs. Olsteen was apparently upset that her flight attendants had not attended her so well. Someone had spilled a liquid on the arm of her first class seat and none of the attendants would anything about it. Reportedly, Mrs. Olsteen became quite upset and demanded some attention to her needs.

I love this kind of thing because it so clearly illustrates how even the (apparently) most evolved of us can get triggered into primitive responses and look like idiots. Now, I don’t know if Mrs. Olsteen actually did as Ms Brown claims, but clearly the women were upset. Neither of them chose to respond, both were, rather clearly operating from a survival mechanism that resulted in both feeling hurt and angry.

Survival mode

When this kind of primitive response kicks in our brains don’t work so well. Ms Brown has apparently been involved in other disputes of this kind so I am guessing she has a bit of the Self-Protector in her and doesn’t have a clue how this impacts other people. Not that it justifies the reported behavior of Mrs. Olsteen. But it does help us understand and have some empathy for her frustration.

I can picture it now. The beautiful and extremely well dressed Victoria Olsteen gets on a plane expecting to be comfortable and well taken care of as is reportedly the usual case in first class (though I certainly wouldn’t know for sure). She sits down in an outfit that is undoubtedly worth more than everything in my entire closet combined and discovers something on the arm of her chair that could ruin her designer garb. She asks for help since this is not really her territory; it’s the flight attendants. Yet she gets no response. She can’t get comfortable and knows she will not be able to relax until the foreign substance is removed. She asks for help again and now she is getting panicked. How is she going to manage to be in a plane for (however long) and relax?

The flight attendant, Ms Brown, obviously rushed, and stressed views Mrs. Olsteen as an obstacle to her goal of getting the flight off the ground. Both went into Self-Protect mode firing angry reactivity toward each other and hurting each other’s feelings.

At any point if one or the other had been able to contain their reactivity and have some empathy for the other person the whole incident could have been avoided. Of course, the onus to be responsible for the incident really lies with Ms Brown as a representative of the airline and a servant to the people on her flight.

A need for compassion

It seems to me that both of these women could use a course in the practice of compassion. Once they both moved into a place of empathy, respect and ownership the whole necessity of legal action would be removed. If Mrs. Olsteen did physically assault Ms Brown than she needs to apologize and take ownership of her part, but so does Ms Brown. Her job as a flight attendant to first class riders is to be there to take care of them.

Clearly she failed to do that. If there was no assault (only the other witnesses on the flight can say for sure) it would behoove Mrs. Olsteen to listen with empathy to what could have provoked this legal attack on her. Perhaps Ms Brown is financially stressed and saw this as an opportunity to help her recover financially from some terrible financial problem. Perhaps Ms Brown wanted to please Mrs. Olsteen and was hurt at how angry Mrs. Olsteen was by her failure to respond. Whatever the cause, both women own a part in what happened and if that is not recognized in the legal process it certainly should be in some kind of moral or ethical sense. I hope the Olsteens can recognize this because it changes everything. Once you allow yourself to step into compassion and out of the egocentric combatant role everything changes.

What do you think?

I’d love to hear what you think of this. Do you think Mrs. Olsteen was the bad actor in this case, or is this a case of overblown litigiousness? Did Ms Brown fall short of her job duties and cry foul to save her job? Comment below.

The Ethics of Compassion

2008-08-04T19:57:58.105-05:00

The Five Principles

In January 2008 the “Ethics Guy” Bruce Weinstein, Ph. D, started writing abut his “Five Principles” of ethics in Business Week magazine. His principles are these:

• Do no harm

• Make things better

• Respect others

• Be fair

• Be compassionate

Weinstein says, “These principles reveal the secret to living a rich, satisfying, and happy life, and we have known about them for more than 5,000 years. Every religious tradition in the world teaches them, as do parents in every country.”

Why don’t we do them?

He is right; of course, these are principles we have all been taught for generations. But if we all know about them, why don’t we practice them?

Our primitive brain takes over our rational thinking when we feel threatened in any way, that’s why. Our sense of threat can come from both irrational and logical sources, but the list of potential threats is endless. And, what is threatening to one person may not be in the least threatening to another.

Our primitive brain

It is only by understanding how our primitive brain works that we can begin to practice compassion and the other principles Weinstein talks about. Having respect for others is impossible if we feel badly about ourselves. Being “fair” is impossible if we are fearful of the other person. Making the commitment to “do no harm” is impossible if we don’t recognize that we are all doing the best we can and we will make mistakes. We can’t focus on “making things better” when we feel badly about ourselves and we are fearful for our safety or well-being.

Practicing Compassion

To make the leap into the ethics of the practice of compassion requires courage and determination. Compassion is not just a word to pacify religious scholars. Compassion is a daily practice that requires first being able to be compassionate with ourselves. Taking the leap means being willing to feel the fear of doing things differently than our primitive survival brains tell us we “have” to do them.

Having compassion for our partner’s hurt feelings when we know we didn’t do anything wrong takes courage. Having compassion for our co-worker when they are acting like a jerk takes courage. It takes courage because our instinct is to respond defensively. When we can learn to respond with compassion instead, it changes everything.

What do you think?

Are you able to let down your defenses when you feel attacked? Does that seem like a crazy thing to do. Tell me about it!

A Bitter Sweet Good-bye

2008-08-01T08:15:28.342-05:00

Our summer guest

This summer my family has had the delight of hosting a college student during his Internship at a law firm in Downtown Dallas. We live out side of Dallas in Lewisville. It’s a good 45 minutes to downtown from here, so we had tried to find him a host closer to his work. Fortunately for us, we were unsuccessful.

Though our four bedroom house is already was already bursting at the seams, Alex came to stay with us in the middle of June. Three of our four daughters and our son have been in and out of the house all summer. Heather was still here, until July 1^st, when she started her own Internship for Samsung Mobile Fresh Films. Jenny came home at the end of May, as did Hayley. Jenny was returning from a study abroad in London and Hayley graduated from UTSA. Jenny set off to Australia for yet another study abroad on July 15^th. Hayley has been working part time and looking to find her first “real job”. Meanwhile, Wayne has been here for two weeks at a time, plus some, over the summer. Heather has completed her Internship and is home, now about to graduate from UNT in a week. All of this never rattled Alex, in fact, he seems to have enjoyed the comings and goings of all our crew.

Alex

I don’t even know where to start when talking about Alex. Someone I met with yesterday said “Our kids are just as great when they are guests at someone else’s home.” Well, I certainly hope so! Alex has been cheerful, childlike and yet so grown up all at the same time. He has gotten us to have more sit-down meals together than we have had in all the nine years Mike and I have been married. He participates in these meals, too, volunteering to help cook, set the table and clean afterwards. Some nights he comes in wanting to “bake something” an makes us a cake, crepes, or pudding or something. Every night he brings with him his sweet nature and bright energy.

Every morning he gets up, puts on his freshly laundered white shirt, tie and suit. He has a bowl of cereal and heads for downtown at about 7:45. I can’t say I am always up when he is preparing to leave but when I am, he greets me with his bright “Good morning” and chatter about the toils of going to work for sometimes 14 hours a day. When he gets home early enough he takes a long walk or bike ride. One Saturday afternoon he was bored and cleaned out and rearranged our entire pantry. Another he sat down and made a paper mach¢e bowl. Other times he sits out by the pool or in the park reading. He has also made the best of his time here by exploring area attractions and events. He went to the Dallas Symphony one night, to the Arboretum, to Fair Park and to Sundance Square and the Ft Worth Zoo. He often went to the store for something for himself and either picked up something for us unasked, or thoughtfully asked if there was something he could pick up. Somewhere along in there he took a hold of our hearts.

Stressful summer

It has been a stressful summer anyway, and he has kept us cheerful throughout the difficulties. I became ill going out to California for Athena’s graduation from Law School at the start of the summer. We went to Kerrville New Folk for our annual trip and or fellow Kerrvillian Ronzo died of a heart attack. Mike had a horrible spasm in his shoulder one night and we spent the entire night in the ER. Then I came down with a case of Shingles. Just as I was recovering from the Shingles I underwent a minor operation to remove a pre-cancerous cyst on my side. And of course, we moved my things out of my office, and re-arranged two entire rooms of our house to accommodate my things. Alex helped us with it all, even scrubbing the office floor on his hands and knees to remove the gunk left by the lining used to keep the (now removed) rug from slipping on the wood floor.

Yesterday was Mike’s birthday and he is the only one- none of our kids - got him a card. And last night he got me a huge bag of Sour Patch Kids (my one real vice.)

The gift

When Jenny left for Australia, he got her a gift as his “host” for the summer (it was her friend from NYU that asked Jenny to find Alex a place). Jenny thought he would get Mike and I something, too. At the time I thought, “Wow, that’s completely unnecessary. Alex has been such a gift to us- we should get him something.”

He is leaving tomorrow and I am not ready! I didn’t fully understand how much I am not ready until I woke up this morning crying. I had a dream about his leaving in which he gave us each a gift card as a going away gift, and I handed mine back to him. I told him, “You don’t have to do this because you have been such a gift to us.” Then I put my arms around him and started to cry, I said. “We don’t want you to go!”

I woke up sobbing, Mike heard me and put his arms around me. It was then I realized how close Alex is to the age Lance would have been now. Alex is 19 and Lance would be 20. Saying good-bye to Alex feels like saying good-bye to Lance. Lance was seven weeks old when he dies of Sudden Infant Death.

Oh, I get it now

Coincidentally I am closing my office today. It marks the beginning of my moving into a new career path. Oh, I will still be seeing some clients in another office, but the move is a clearly defined moment of moving my career path. And my counseling career has been a kind of monument to Lance. It was after he died that I went back to school and got my degree in Counseling. For me, it was a way to make some meaning out of his passing. The coincidental convergence of these two losses in one day is strangely poetic. I let go of both my “monument” to Lance and (while I wasn’t consciously aware of it) an adult representation of of who Lance might have been in the form of Alex.

I don't know how to say good-bye

As I write this he is upstairs getting ready for his last day at his Internship. We are leaving tonight, probably before he gets home, for my 35^th (yes, that’s right, 35^th) High School Reunion. So I will say my good-bye this in a few minutes with a bittersweet pain in my heart.

BYE ALEX!