Reality is always to be found in the messiness in between two people.
Not a week goes by without listening to massive numbers of people, who are only committed to their own point of view. I watch them completely erase the other person’s concerns over & over. One example: “I can have an affair but if you find someone else while we are separated that is sooo humiliating & unfair for me!”
People storm out. People hear apologies that never happen. People erase apologies. People won’t tolerate a hard question, “Do you think you drink too much?” “Why don’t we have sex?” People erupt like a volcano to shut down conversations. It is manipulative to insist only upon your own point of view by blasting away everything else.
This is all about avoiding the messy uncertainty of dialogue. It’s a whole lot easier to make a feeble attempt and then erase what may have been confusing or uncomfortable with the lovely option of what they already know & are absolutely certain about.
Being a grownup is being able to tolerate disagreements and understanding that complicatedness is the only way to recover truth. A whole lot of people are simply not interested in this.
Our two political parties are too polarized for enough respectful problem solving to take place. It’s scary that each side is too filled up with certainty and self-righteousness.
The military did it – as if “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” addresses any kind of reality that works. Which is why it is no longer enforced.
Even countries do it, Greece is drowning in debt & the protesters don’t want anything to change. Charlie Sheen did it.
We do it within ourselves when we pretend overweight is ok, that we’re not really that narcissistic or that we didn’t really spend too much money.
Asking couples to go home and work out a budget, find out what interest rate they pay on each credit card or read a book on rekindling sexual desire…it’s amazing how few follow through because reality is hard and uncomfortable.
There’s a lot of comfort in self-righteous certainty. As a country we seem to be overdoing it.
Reality really involves seriously swimming around in messy uncertainty. Doubt is a part of openness which is the only way to solve the massive problems we face, whether as a couple or as a country. No one has a corner on the truth. Sacrifice is required for either couples or countries to get back on track.
