A Mirror and a Window

Good marriage counseling should present to the client opportunities to change. First, it should be the opportunity to look in the mirror and see himself, his strengths, and his weaknesses. No person can change his or her spouse. We can only change ourselves. That, however, isn’t easy to learn, but if you do, it will be because you learned to look in the mirror at yourself. If you are not aware of what needs changing and you have no motivation to change, then things will remain the same no matter how much you dislike our life.

 So in most cases, the job of the counselor is to present you with a mirror where you can observe yourself. You may like some of the things you see, but most likely you will also dislike other things you see. This is called insight where you understand that you are being unfair, unreasonable, controlling, impatient, unkind, or uncaring. Since you don’t like what you see, and you want to change. You then ask, “How can I change this?” Now the client is ready to accept strategies that will lead them toward effective change. No change is easy, but all change starts with understanding the need to change, and that starts with the mirror.

 The second aspect of good counseling is the opportunity to look through a window. In this window, you see your spouse in a different way than you have before. You see their pain, their frustration, their fear, their anger, their sadness, their anxiety, their joy, or enthusiasm. The window allows you to see what you missed—what’s never been in your view before. What you see helps you to understand your husband or your wife better. You begin to see the positive aspects of your partner that your anger and resentment obscured from your view. You also see your contribution to the negative emotions in your spouse that you dislike so much. The distorted image of the other person slowly begins to focus.

 When a couple comes to me for counseling, I evaluate how focused they are on changing each other. Most are obsessed with changing the other. You hear it in their complaints. I know if we are going to make progress, they will have to look in the mirror first. If this happens, then their attitudes change, which begins the process of change for both. Often couples have become accustomed to dysfunctional patterns of communication, avoidance, and conflict. When allowed to look through a window and see their spouse, which they have taken for granted, they are surprised at what they see.

 The mirror and the window can only do so much. They can help change the perspective. They can help each person find insight and motivate them to change. They can help clear up the confusion. However, that’s as far as they go. Each person makes a crucial response as to whether they want to change or not. If they persist in blaming their spouse or they allow their hurts to be unforgivable—then no counseling or therapy can help them. The clients have to see where they want to go and determine they are going to make the necessary changes to get there.

It is extremely gratifying for me to see a couple make progress. All the hard work of talking, listening, explaining, and focusing on strategies of change starts to work. Negative emotions give way to positive emotions, and avoidance turns to connection as forgiveness does its work. Walls that have been erected over the years start to come down. The couple that was so far apart and so broken now begins to enjoy each other. They accept what they have rejected and affirm what they criticized. Their mutual enjoyment shines on their faces!

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The Power of the Choice

In the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Colossians he encouraged the young Christians to set their hearts on Christ—on things above, and not on earthy things. He clearly explained what he meant by giving a list of the earthly things, “sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry” (Colossians 3:3-6). Then Paul made an extraordinary statement, “You used to walk in these ways, in the life you once lived.  But now you must rid yourselves of all such things as these: anger, rage, malice, slander, and filthy language from your lips. Do not lie to each other, since you have taken off your old self with its practices and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the image of its Creator” (Col 3:7-9).

I am completely struck with the words “But now you must rid yourself of all such things…” Just because these believers had placed their faith in Christ did not mean that all the negative stuff in their lives was miraculously swept away. There is no such thing as automatic spiritual growth. Paul underscored an important truth, which is that God has given us a free will that we exercise through the power of our individual choices. When Paul says to us, “You get rid of these things,” he is referring to something that will only happen if we make it happen. We choose to stop lying, we choose to stop stealing, we choose to stop losing control of our temper, we choose to stop slandering others, and we choose to stop using profanity. By the same token, we choose to put on the mature, appropriate behavior. We choose to tell the truth, we choose to be honest, and we choose to control our emotions and our tongues.

I love words because they are the vehicles of how we communicate with each other. One of my favorite words is magnanimous. It means to be big-hearted, which is the opposite of being petty and small. It means to be generous in forgiving an insult while remaining free from petty resentfulness. I propose that people choose to be magnanimous or they choose to be petty. I for one am trying to choose to be magnanimous every day. It is a better way to live.

We love to find excuses for the bad ways we treat others and how we misbehave, but the truth is that we chose to act that way. We will continue to act badly until we rid ourselves of those earthy things and choose to dress ourselves in ways that more resemble Christ.

Making Sense Out of Chaos

After Jesus died on the cross, his disciples and friends were left devastated and disillusioned. Their world had been turned upside down. The man who they believed to be the Messiah didn’t survive to see his 34^th birthday. He had been cruelly murdered and left to die all alone. A disciple by the name of Cleopas and an unnamed disciple were walking from Jerusalem to their village. While they were walking, they talked to each other, but their thoughts were chaotic and their faces were sad. As they walked, Jesus joined them and began to talk to them, but they never imagined that this stranger could be Jesus. Jesus never identified himself, instead he entered their conversation.

Two disciples who felt powerless and useless were fresh out of hope, and yet Jesus wanted to walk and talk with them. As they continued to talk, the core problem came to light, “but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place.” (Luke 24:21).

There were so many emotions inside of these broken hearts. They felt anger and resentment toward those responsible for murdering Jesus. They felt shame and the feeling of uselessness for not being able to defend or save him from his cruel enemies. They felt frustration that the one they had hoped would rescue their country and redeem their people was now dead. They felt bewildered as if there were pieces of the puzzle missing. Try as hard as they could, they simply couldn’t put it together. They had been so close to their dreams, and now they seemed so far way. In fact, their dreams had been buried with Jesus. Their minds seemed inadequate to figure out the mess.

After listening to the talk, Jesus finally offered a fresh perspective, "How foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! Did not the Christ have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?" And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself” (Luke 24:25-27).

Jesus has the ability to make sense of things. The whole desperate situation seemed to have no explanation, but Jesus came to give them one. They were looking for answers, and Jesus didn’t leave them to wander in their perplexity but came near to explain the unexplainable. He listened to them before he talked. Isaiah said that he had come to bind up the broken hearted, and no one does such a wonderful job as he can. Remember, Jesus is a real friend; he will walk with us when we are at our lowest.

Jesus knew the heart of the problem was they did not understand the scriptures sufficiently to help them in this situation. He gently rebuked them for their lack of belief and then proceeded to teach them the scriptures. The Lord showed them exactly what had happened through the scriptures.

After walking with Jesus for seven miles and listening to him teach the scriptures, something happened to these two disciples. Something inside of them was different. In their own words they said, "Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?" (Luke 24:32).

I encourage you to let Jesus walk with you and talk to you so that he can help you make sense of the chaos. He can help you gain a new perspective. How long has it been since your heart burned with any kind of excitement?

Emotional Connection

As a counselor, I see people with a variety of problems; however, I have observed that many problems have one root cause. That cause is an emotional disconnection with the person or people they love. When a husband and wife lose their connection, they are going to experience difficulties. If they don’t recognize what is happening and go to work on it immediately, there will be consequences. When a couple has to deal with the pain of an affair, it is a horrible experience. What is so important for me to help them discover is that the affair was the culmination of their emotional disconnection—not the beginning. Disconnections always begin in simple ways, such as that of not doing the kind and loving things for each other that characterize connected relationships. However, they also include an element of betrayal. Brene Brown has capably written on this subject in a fine book entitled Daring Greatly:

In fact, this betrayal usually happens long before the other ones. I’m talking about the betrayal of disengagement. Of not caring. Of letting the connection go. Of not being willing to devote time and effort to the relationship. The word betrayal evokes experiences of cheating, lying, breaking a confidence, failing to defend us to someone else who’s gossiping about us, and not choosing us over other people. These behaviors are certainly betrayals, but they’re not the only form of betrayal. If I had to choose the form of betrayal that emerged most frequently from my research and that was the most dangerous in terms of corroding the trust connection, I would say disengagement.

When the people we love or with whom we have a deep connection stop caring, stop paying attention, stop investing, and stop fighting for the relationship, trust begins to slip away and hurt starts seeping in. Disengagement triggers shame and our greatest fears— the fears of being abandoned, unworthy, and unlovable. What can make this covert betrayal so much more dangerous than something like a lie or an affair is that we can’t point to the source of our pain—there’s no event, no obvious evidence of brokenness.[i]

Every person who knows the genuine satisfaction of being connected to another person in a loving relationship (the best example of this is marriage) also knows the work of guarding that connection. There are a host of things that can erode that connection: work, sickness, depression, disappointment, or just the unpredictability of life. Healthy relationships stay healthy because they stay connected. That doesn’t happen by accident, but rather because two people choose to make it happen every day of their lives.

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[i] Brown, Brene (2012-09-11). Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent, and Lead (pp. 51-52). Penguin Group US. Kindle Edition.