I was talking to a client a couple of weeks ago and we came to a topic I think is worth sharing with everyone.
Lynn is a young mother with a 1-year-old baby and is married to Jerrik, the owner of a reasonably successful business. She has difficulties getting along with Jerrik’s parents. She told me, they aren’t great at communication and from what she’s said about them, it sounds like they often use guilt to get what they want from people. Lynn has tried to talk to them about this in the past, but it hasn’t helped. Her in-laws have responded by saying things like, “Well, that’s just too bad that you feel like that.” and, “that’s your opinion. It has nothing to do with us.”
She knows that Jerrik loves her, but resents that he hardly ever stands up to his parents when she needs him to.
It’s complicated. On one hand, Lynn would love to have a loving, nurturing connection with them. On the other hand, she feels “sick and tired” of the whole situation and wants to “throw in the towel.” She feels guilty when she doesn’t call them, even though she doesn’t want to and resents them. And to top off, she feels responsible for Jerrik’s relationship with his parents. What Lynn really wants is for everybody to be happy and this is a seemingly unsolvable situation.
What is the best way to go about a tricky situation like this?
Here one of the most important tips I have found to be true again and again:
If it doesn’t “resonate” to do something, then it’s better not to do it.
“Why?” you might ask. “Isn’t that a selfish way to go about life? Shouldn’t I put others in front of me?”
It might look selfish at first, but it really isn’t in the long run. Doing something we don’t want to, doing something to please someone else, is a very quick way to avoid immediate difficulty AND to become resentful, deflated and even depressed. When we continuously please others at our own expense, we begin to feel victimized and eventually powerless. Most times, we’re not even fully aware of what we’re doing and just know that we aren’t feeling good about ourselves.
The powerlessness comes from not trusting ourselves, overriding our own intuition and giving our power away. When we do something we really do not enjoy, we are ignoring our highest guidance and falling victim to old patterns of “being the good boy/girl”. It simply doesn’t feel good underneath.
The question is: Does it really serve Lynn to avoid feeling guilty but instead feel like a victim and prisoner in her own life? Does it serve her relationship with her husband and her child and even her relationship with in-laws to pretend to be smaller than she is? Wouldn’t they benefit from her feeling empowered, strong and happy?
When Lynn and I looked at this together, she immediately saw the price she was paying for pleasing her in-laws. She hadn’t realized how much this seemingly small decision (made over and over) had affected her whole life.
She said she’d work on it…
I’ve been in touch with Lynn recently and she told me she’s making progress. She said that she’s better about creating boundaries for herself. She hasn’t opted to end the relationship, but she’s given herself permission to disappoint and/or upset her in-laws in certain situations. She’s getting better at being OK with people getting upset around her when she doesn’t always do what’s expected of her. She said that she’s surprised how a clear “no” to even a small matter, builds her self-confidence and strength. She didn’t expect that something so little would have such a big impact on her.
I hope is that reading this will help you to trust yourself, your own resonance, a little more when you are faced with a similar situation. My wish for you is simply that you will be more able to say, “No” when you want to, when it right for you, more often.
I hope this helps.
Dave