Tag: Relationship Counseling

Pain vs. Suffering

by Nathan Chua

There’s an old aphorism that goes, “Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional,” credited to Japanese writer, Haruki Murakami.*  Have you seen a kid who was disappointed by a parent or primary caretaker who wasn’t as appreciative of a pyramid of blocks it created, and then proceeds to wipe out the masterpiece with one quick stroke of an arm?  I do remember myself doing so but can’t remember what my creation was.  If we look closely, we as adults sometimes revert to this way of coping with the inevitable hard feelings or the pain we get in situations at home, at work, and at random moments in our days. 

I am here borrowing a series of questions you might ask yourself when faced with a challenging moment in these situations.  This can help you see if you may be causing more pain on top of what is already an emotionally difficult moment.  I borrowed this from a book written by experts in functional analytic psychotherapy.**

  • In that situation, can you notice what it is that you do in reaction to it?  
  • If another person is involved, what do they do in response to your reaction?
  • What do you think it is that you do that aggravates or contributes to the problem?
  • Did the way you reacted show up in other places or with other people?
  • What is immediately rewarding about what you do?
  • What is it costing you in the short term?
  • What do you foresee will happen if you continue doing what you’re doing in the long run?
  • What would happen if you stopped doing what you’re doing now?  What would you have to be willing to accept?
  • Is there a purpose important enough for you to accept or face that?

In your relationships with your partner or your family:

When people in close relationships fight, there’s usually a reason for such behaviors.  Very often life’s stressors provide enough of a catalyst for differences and emotional sensitivities to be highlighted.  Couples and parents often believe that their partners or children need to be exactly just like them.  There is a tendency to believe that what is evident to one should be evident to the other.  There is nothing wrong with these thoughts for that is a typical function of our minds.  We compare and find out what should or should not be the same.  However, in your attempts to change the other, what results do you notice you get?  And if you didn’t do this, maybe you would have to accept that you and your kid or your spouse are different from you.  Now is there a purpose here for which you would be willing to accept that?        

In your relationships at work

Just like in other areas in your life, change happens at work.  Let’s take for example your boss.  We all hope that we have only one boss who happens to like us and the way we work, usually for life!  Unfortunately, that is not, most of the time, under our control.  Many decisions from within the hierarchical structure are handed down from above.  So ask yourself the questions posed above.  Let’s say you end up consuming hours contemplating how bad things have been since your company had a change of management.  You may notice that there are short term costs involved in this behavior, like procrastinating on your work tasks.  In the long term, such a habit can only lead up to you losing your job or getting bad marks on your performance.  Would you be willing to accept the fact that companies change and at times your boss will frustrate or be different from you?  What would be reason enough for you to accept this reality?  Is it the family that you love and care about who depend on your job to sustain their needs or even lifestyles?  Is it that long wished for vacation that you planned to spend with loved ones?          

At random moments    

You and I know that driving in a megapolis like Metro Manila can be rather challenging.  Anger and frustration are easy to come by when you have to contend with multiple threats to your peaceful drive home.  When you yell and scream inside your vehicle while your kids and partner are with you, what do you notice are the payoffs and both short and long term negative consequences?  Has it gotten in the way of an otherwise happy ride home?  Would you have to accept that at times driving in an overcrowded city can be challenging?  Is your drive home important enough of a reason for you to hold your peace?  

There you go my friends.  Hope these examples will give you a snippet of what you can learn from what the experts have painstakingly worked to provide us with, which is the knowledge that we are not free from life’s pains, but we are free to choose how we respond to them.  Will we follow old rules of thumb that have both long and short term costs to what otherwise are things we most cherish about our jobs and relationships?  Or will we stop and take a step back and see from a distance what we can do differently to avert the costs and live well in the moment?

*https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/613585-pain-is-inevitable-suffering-is-optional-say-you-re-running-and

**FAP Made Simple by Holman, Kanter, Tsai, Kohlenberg

Are you in a mixed or mixed-race relationship?

by Nathan Chua

It is hard enough being married, it can be even more frustrating when you and your spouse or partner grew up in completely different environments and cultures.  If you’re like most couples I know, a big part of the decision to get married is laced with dreams of unbounded passion and caring that will never end.  Well, if you’re over that part, you’re part of the majority.  In other words, it’s just what to expect when you have spent enough time together.  The passion dies out and it’s time to grow up and take your relationship beyond infatuation.    

A quick look at the definition of a mixed marriage is one where the parties involved are of different racial or religious backgrounds.  It’s quite often that the couples I see with this type of configuration will both tell me about how shocked they are to discover how different their perspectives are.  One partner may perceive the other as being too direct or harsh with their conversations, while the other feels that it is healthy to be direct.  One may follow certain customs that for the other spouse is completely unnecessary and wasteful.

Most of the time, I see couples bogged down with content.  The arguments remain on the surface.  These can come in the form of who did what first, or if you didn’t do this, I would have done this rather than do what I just did.  You can just imagine how tiring this cycle can be.  You and your partner or spouse end up lawyering for yourselves.  You have become unbudgeable and are feeling major contempt for your partner. 

It is hard and I recognize that.  Nothing could be more true than to say that these differences can turn out to be stinkers in your relationship.  You’ve made a turn to a section on the road to that paradise where you seem to be stuck in an arid desert. 

There is a way though for you and your spouse to find ways to grow in your relationship with these differences.  The key is to see that you have started to conceive of these differences as defects.  They’ve gone through the math, there is no way you can marry someone who is compatible with you.  In fact, the probability that you end up with someone incompatible is, guess what?  One hundred percent!

Metaphor:

One thing I really like about what I have learned in my approaches to individual as well as couples therapy, is the use of metaphors in my work.  One metaphor that I find extremely useful in my personal life is the metaphor of the blind or injured friend.  Now let’s suppose that you had a friend you love who you go out jogging with every weekend.  Unfortunately, that friend of yours suffered an injury one day and then could not jog as fast as you do anymore or keep the usual pace you had when he was still without injury.  Would you expect your friend to run just the same way he did as before the injury?  Would you slow down for your friend to keep pace, so at the same time you are doing this activity together, you can do the usual chatting you’re used to?

If you are like most people I know, you would.  Why?  Because you love your friend that much.   

One last thing, when you do such a thing with your friend, or in this case your spouse, try looking through their eyes and see what’s behind them.  Maybe you will see a reflection of the person you want to be towards someone you vowed to love and care for.  It’s hard yet fulfilling, because you probably saw that in someone else who inspired you to do so in the past.  Someone who was willing to give you a hand when you needed it.  Maybe that someone who cared is now who you see as a reflection in those eyes that smile back at you and say they love you and appreciate your love.  Relish and be mindful of those moments.  Maybe they are what will put meaning and purpose in your mixed relationship.

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