The Anatomy of Peace: Part IV

The short last chapter of the book discusses spreading peace; how to take what we've learned within The Anatomy of Peace and bring it into the lives of those around us. The concepts around spreading the peace include staying out of the box myself, building the relationship, listening & learning and teaching.  Along with the Peacemaking Pyramid, there are several lessons that are included.

The first lesson of the pyramid is that the most time and effort should be spent at the lower levels of the pyramid.  This makes a lot of sense to me.  Before you can invite change in others, you have to be committed to change inside yourself.  The book cites an example that when we choose to engage in a correction of some kind that the lower levels are even more important. This is true in my life, if my heart is at war, there is no change in behavior regardless of the consequence.

The second lesson of the pyramid is that the solution to a problem at one level of the pyramid is always below that level of the pyramid.  This brings me back to the Albert Einstein quote.  “No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”  The third and final lesson is that in the end my effectiveness at each level of the pyramid depends on the deepest level of the pyramid – my way of being.  This just wraps around the concept for me.     

Ultimately, this isn't about anyone else. This is about me, how I choose to BE, and where my heart is.  Its not about my husband, my kids, family or daycare children.  Its about my heart.  From here its all about choosing to honor or betray and choosing a heart at peace or a heart at war.  There is more work to be done here, this I know but I think I can move forward with my husband, not against him. I choose to have my heart at peace, through the love I feel for my family and through the culmination of this disagreement.

The Anatomy of Peace: Part III

Now you're in the box.  Now what?  The first part of getting out of the box is seeing that you are in the box.  Simple, but not easy. Looking for signs of being in the box, the feelings/emotions, justifications, etc we can see our box and make the decision to stay in the box, or get out. 

Next it is a helpful point, to remember times that you weren't in the box, either with other relationships or other places or times.  I think this step can seem superficial, but I think its important in changing our emotions from overly negative to a more neutral place.
  
After getting in touch with what life feels like out of the box, the next step is to view the situation and person with the new perspective.  There are several questions to ask ourselves to help see the situation and person anew. 

• What are this person's or people's challenges, trials, burdens and pains?
• How am I, or some group of which I am a part, adding to these challenges, trials, burdens, and pains?
• In what other ways have I or my group neglected to mistreated this person or group?
• In what ways are my boxes obscuring the truth about others and myself and interfering with potential solutions?
• What am I feeling I should do for this person or group? What could I do to help?

    All of these questions take us through seeing the other person as a person, rather than an object.  As I ask these questions of myself regarding my spouse, I see my husband's challenges as a provider over the past years, I see his burden of feeling inadequate, I see the pain that caused.  I see that I am adding to these challenges simply with the request for another child. I see that the thought of added responsibility for him is overwhelming.  I have been obscuring the truth about him even inside the argument. I've been seeing him as an obstacle, I've been seeing his feelings as an obstacle as well. I've seen him as mistreating me and I've seen myself as a unappreciated by him.  What I'm feeling I should do for this person is honor his feelings about increasing our family size.  I can take action to communicate to my husband I hear, understand and respect his feelings. I may still not agree, but I can honor him through the disagreement.

The Anatomy of Peace: Part II

“No one can force a warring heart upon us. When our hearts go to war, we ourselves have chosen it.” 
 

((This diagram was taken from another website, I don't know anyone named Kent.  But the concept is still the same. ))

In the past, in learning about emotional growth and behavior modification, I learned the concept of accountability: the ability to account for the choices that I made. I consider myself an accountable person, I believe that I live my life from the perspective that I make my own choices rather than believing that others made them for me. I do not play the role of the victim, nor do I take blame for choices that others own.

That being said, the concept of the accountability was always behavior based for me; very much about the choice I made outwardly.  I'm no stranger to a little introspection, it usually wasn't accompanied with accountability like looking at my outward choices and behaviors. 
  
The key in The Anatomy of Peace, is that our way of being trumps our behavior.  This extended in my mind very quickly to: I'm not only accountable for my outward behavior, I'm accountable for my heart or my inward way of being.  Just as I am accountable for losing my keys, I'm accountable for my heart being at war with my husband over our conflict.  

The choice to betray the sense, to betray myself is a choice to go to war.   Once I betray myself, then I automatically start looking for justifications.  Its here, in the box, that my perceptions go askew. I need to justify my self-betrayal, by justifying my view of the other person that I've chosen to see as an object.  The next sections of the book explains the common ways that people are in their box. 

  These boxes were overwhelming at first. I saw myself in each of them at different times or with different people.  I think that's partly the point, however.  That we use any way that we can to justify our betrayal.  Once we are in the box we want to stay there.  I see myself the most often lately in the worse-than box. I find myself jealous, bitter and feeling hopeless.  I often say that life is hard and that once you accept it, its easier.  That all seems so sad in retrospect.
    What I really appreciate about the boxes, especially lining them up like this, is that I can pinpoint my box easily by taking a look at what feelings I'm experiencing.  Once I can identify that, it seems like the rest of the box just fits the situation and circumstance.

Whuck.

Seriously.  I'm interrupting my happy Christmas trees and Countdown to Christmas to swing into negativity.

This just happened and I'm sure that I'll regret posting this later.  But its my journal.

Its 9:07 a.m.  My appointment with the therapist is at 10 a.m.

Ian told me 10 minutes ago that he doesn't want me to go.  That he thought I was bluffing when I said I wanted to go. 

He said that he thinks I was using therapy as a bargaining chip to get him to agree to have another baby.

What the fuck am I supposed to say to that?   What an ass.   I'm pissed, I'm hurt.  I can't believe I'm married to this man that resents the decisions that I make.  This man that sees me as less than he is.

He's agreed to have another baby.  (In a very adult way, not snarky or shitty)  Now he thinks that I don't need to go to therapy and that I should cancel an hour before.  Never mind that I've had the appointment for 10 days. Never mind that I've been talking about this for a month. Nope, he wants to assert his power and pull the plug this morning. Oh well.  He doesn't get to.

The Anatomy of Peace: Part I

 Albert Einstein said that  “No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.”

In the preface of The Anatomy of Peace the authors note that “...our problems, as theirs, are not what they seem. This is at once our challenge and our opportunity.”   As I read this book, I applied the lessons to a current conflict in my life:  I want to have more children and my husband does not.

First the Ways of Being Diagram:

        
       
    This concept was introduced to me first during the Choice Seminar that Tim Eicher presented to my Family Relationships class.  From my past experience with Cross Creek, I'm familiar with the importance of your “way of being”.  Although the concept of your “way of being” delineated into two categories was very new.  At this point in the book and in the seminar, I was simply intrigued by a concept that I hadn't heard before.  Quite frankly, its not everyday that I'm exposed to new information regarding emotional growth. 

“If we have deep problems, it's because we are failing at the deepest part of the solution.  And when we fail at this deepest level, we invite our own failure.”  I can see how I have failed at the deepest level inside this conflict with my husband.  I can see how I have invited his heart to be at war.  I can see how I have created my heart being at war.

    As I started to see this about myself I kept reading and the next concept in the book was that we create collusion not conflict.   At first, I didn't understand the point of using the word collusion.  I looked it up for further explanation.  Merriam-Webster defines collusion “as secret agreement or cooperation especially for an illegal or deceitful purpose.”  In the context of these concepts, I don't have conflict with my husband, I have a secret cooperation for a deceitful purpose: to create hearts at war.

**This is really one long post split into 4, so To Be Continued**

Please remember this is my journal. .. ..

Wow.  Heartbreaking.  I finally had the conversation that I've been avoiding with Ian.  It went horribly wrong.

He's still in the same position - he doesn't want more kids.  Not really shocking, but definitely not what I wanted to hear.

The whole pregnancy seems to far away.  Seems like years ago.  I can't believe it was just a week ago.

I wanted to get pregnant for so long.  3 years.  I can't even begin to describe how happy I was when I found out.  My grief and sorrow feels insurmountable. Thursday was Thanksgiving and I couldn't help but feeling down.  I felt like I should be so thankful for what I have -- but that's not actually how I felt.  I felt sorry for myself.

And really, that really sucks.  I hate feeling sorry for myself. 

Now I'm at this place.... I have to give up this thought.  This dream of wanting more kids. Or I'm going to lose my husband.  I guess either way, its over.  I'm not having more kids.  Either I can keep pushing my husband, which isn't going to bring us out of conflict ---  its going to bring us to divorce.

But how can I mesh all of these things together? My husband doesn't want to "come to my rescue" and swallow his wants for mine.  He simply doesn't want more kids.

So to stay married --- I have to give up this part of me.  I don't even know how to do that at this point.  3 month ago -- before the pregnancy and miscarriage -- I felt like I could have.  But now? 

How am I supposed to give that part up now that I've been through all of this?

How am I supposed to honor myself, honor him and move forward with my life?

Learning from my parents...

My mom and step father have been married since I was 5 years old.  Almost 25 years ago they got married, it was my mom's third marriage and my step dad's second.  I refer to them as my parents.   We recently had a long & interesting conversation about what makes a marriage work.

One of my parents' main marital strengths is their ability to choose their battles wisely.  They don't get into conflict about petty, insignificant disagreements. They have an amazing ability to talk about just about anything without getting into conflict.  They find humor in everyday life and that binds them together.

Choosing my battles is definitely not one of my innate strengths.  I have difficulty choosing my battles with my children and my spouse.  I find myself getting upset about insignificant events frequently.  I easily see how finding a new process would dramatically improve my relationships. 

So why do I seem to continue to struggle with this?  Some thoughts to ponder, I suppose.

Love battles Reality

I met my husband online.  Yep, true story.  I was about to start my senior year in high school.  We continued a long distance relationship through the entire school year before we move in together. We were madly in love. We talked on the phone for hours, chatted online for hours and spent entire weekends together as much as we could.  I took him to my senior prom.  We were "high school sweethearts" in a very uncommon sense of the term.

I have to say that reality set into our relationship about 4 months after we moved in together.  It was about October of 1999.  I had recently quit my job and Ian was starting a Youth Transport Company with a slime ball that won't be named.

Money was tight.  Very tight.  We started fighting, and I mean really fighting.  I remember leaving the apartment one night in anger and driving North, heading home to Colorado. At some point, I turned around and went back to our apartment. Obviously.

As money evened out so did our relationship. We've since grown up a lot more since then.    I got a real jobby job, rather than working swing shifts at a minimum wage job. Our relationship really hit reality at another level.  We got married, we bought a house, we had kids.

We've dealt with huge financial blows, several million job changes, Ian going to school, me going to school, two pregnancies, two labors, 3+ years of breastfeeding, job loss, alcohol abuse, 15 children in our small home for the last year... and a plethora of other issues that I can't even begin to account for. 


But, life moved on and we've stayed married, happily.

D-I-V-O-R-C-E

There would be fewer divorces...

If people would love more, fight less, critizice less
If people would be willing to truly listen to their partners
If we were willing to alter our perception of what love means
If being in love - if that feeling - lasted forever
Or if we knew that it didn't... we wouldn't have to pretend we always felt "in love" with our partners

The bottom line.
Marriage takes work.  Its not supposed to be easy.  Its not supposed to be rainbows and butterflies all the time.

The purpose of any relationship is simply to hold a mirror so that you may see yourself more clearly. 

Marriage isn't just any relationship however, its THE relationship.  The most important relationship with another to show you  - yourself.  So that you may, change old habits for new habits.  Grow by making small steps everyday to become more loving, strong or compassionate. Create more patience, more consistency, little by little.