The Merits of Looking at My Own Problems
Last night I sat down with my wife for some deep dialog, the topic centered around conflicting views between she and my mom.
I’ll save the details. Though suffice to say that I played a major role in it.
How? It’s only natural that mom and wife tend to have conflicting views towards the same phenomenon, as known for thousands of years. But how does the husband play a part in it?
As it turned out, my wife felt that I tend to side with my mom and was not supportive of her, which made her feel frustrated, alienated, and distanced. When I’m trying to play out the role of the obedient son, as considered a Chinese virtue, I’m also alienating her feelings.
While I also felt powerless and not knowing what to do, or what to respond, I could see and agree with her that I’m definitely part of the problem. In fact, I might be the pivotal part in whether things will get better or worse, in the future.
I could certainly take on a “no, you’re wrong” or “well.. maybe you’re right, but I’m just doing my part” kind of attitude, but it was very apparent, that it won’t help things at all.
I have been reading “The Anatomy of Peace”, and one story made an impression on me: a teenage girl Jenny was brought by parents to a camp to reconcile family relations, yet she was told of the trip’s purpose only after in the car. She ran away immediately upon arrival, barefooted.
The camp sent out two young people of similar ages, who were past participants, to check on her safety. When they caught up with her and noticed that she was without shoes, the girl chaser offered to get some shoes for Jenny.
“No!” was Jenny’s response. The girl then offered to take off her own shoes for Jenny to protect her feet. “No!” again. What happened then was mind-blowing: the chasers (a boy and a girl) both took off their shoes, while continuing the chase.
At last they arrived at a shopping mall, when Jenny saw a friend and stopped to confide. Having running barefooted on hot midday pavements, all three of them had bleeding feet. Jenny’s friend listened, but responded: “they seem alright”. In the end, Jenny went back to the camp.
What happened was the camp’s philosophy was to teach people to see others as “humans” and not “objects”. When the chasing youth took off their own shoes, it was a sign to be align with Jenny, to feel in her situation, to be the same as her, but not “better-than” or “I-deserve” than her.
Although I’m not yet sure the specifics of how I could help my wife or to act so I may be both mom’s good son and the good husband to my wife. What I do know for sure is that as a first step, I’ll need to “take off my shoes”.
