The more we’re trying to change anyone, the more they will be resisting us.
Relationships are what family therapists call “emotional systems.” The most important characteristic of which is how more or less reactive the persons involved are to one another. Reactivity, however defensive or provocative, may be expressed on a continuum of attitudes and behaviors, ranging from ostensibly controlling or critical, even aggressive, to more passive, passive-aggressive or avoidant. A system may involve two or more people; as in, for example, a marriage, a family, a friendship, a workplace, a social, religious, fraternal, political, or any other group.
According to this observation, systems seek balance–for good or ill–resulting from the inherent tension between separate-ness and together-ness. The 75-cent word for such balance is “homeostasis.” The consequence of which is that anytime a part of the system changes, the system changes. Which leads to this assessment: the only person we can change is ourselves. And when we change, the other person in the relationship (or persons in the system) will adapt accordingly, consciously or otherwise.
Hopefully, such change will be positive. There is, however, no guarantee that this will be the case. Resistance to change in anyone’s life is typically more the norm than the exception. And at its extremes, this resistance may take either a “get away from” or “get rid of” posture.
So if the change we wish to see in others, as a consequence of change in ourselves–if there is no guarantee that this will be the result–what is guaranteed is that the more we’re trying to change anyone else, the more they will be resisting us.
Here are two examples of what I’m explaining, the first of which is positive; as for the second, the jury is still out.
A dear friend died recently, a former colleague, her husband having died some years ago. Before his death, the husband was actively involved for many years in, as they say, “working the program” of Alcoholics Anonymous as a way of at-taining and main-taining his sobriety; his wife, just as committed for even longer to living out the values of Al-Anon (a program for the spouses of alcoholics)–the primary principle of the latter being–stop trying to change others; change yourself. In her case, this involved her changing her co-dependent and enabling ways of relating to her husband. Or as she once said to me: “The day Joe started to get sober was the day I stopped calling him in sick when he was drunk or hung-over.”
Often, changing ourselves involves the irony of “setting better boundaries” with others, even those we care for most: as a loving gesture, not a resentful one; with grace, not animosity; as a means, ultimately, to a closer, more truly intimate, rather than a distant, estranged relationship. In Al-Anon this is called “detaching with love.” I say ironic, because in a closer, more functionally intimate relationship, those involved will be paying more attention to their own emotional business than to that of anyone else. In other words, they will be less, rather than more reactive. Not for a lack of caring, but because they do care–for another/others as themselves (if you will, Mark 12: 31).
Here’s the second example. One of my graduate students, a mother of four young daughters–recently, she said to me–“I’ve noticed, with one of my daughters in particular, with whom I seem to have the most power-struggles: when she is reacting to me in ways that cause me concern, that I don’t appreciate or find acceptable, I’ve come to realize that what I need to pay more attention to is not as much her attitude and behavior, as to my own in relation to her. That when I’m less reactive to her, I seem to get better cooperation from her. In other words, when I better define myself with her, she seems less reactive to me than when I’m merely reacting to her, when I’m letting her define me.”
Over many years as a marriage counselor, I’ve seen far more couples–often appearing to be headed for “divorce court,” having defaulted to “get rid of” or “get away from” postures with each other, as though each had become but a caricature to the other–I’ve seen more couples reflecting these characteristics than have I seen couples whose relationship had become morally compromised. By “morally compromised,” I’m referring to “dishonesty” or “violence” (in whatever ways either may be interpreted). Or as one woman put it,”I don’t feel as guilty about committing adultery as I do about lying.” When, of course, separating the two is, if not impossible, anything but easy. And when I speak of couples having reduced one another to negative “caricatures”–that’s all he or she is–it’s because I see them quite differently, in more “objectively” positive ways.
Absent a morally compromised marriage, however, I have frequently been able to help couples learn to “manage” their differences, their conflicts, the tension in their relationship, the ways they merely “react” to one another by allowing themselves to be “defined by” the other. For example, “I do this because he does that”; or conversely, “I’m this way because she’s that way.” I’ve been able to help couples learn to manage–more con-structively than de-structively–the fact that they seem to have married “their perfect frustrator”; the irony of how often what is most attractive in another may also become similarly annoying, what is most provocative also most provoking.
Ergo: Relationship Rule #1. The more we’re trying to change anyone, the more they will be resisting us.
