I’m finding myself contemplating that RD/RD within a ‘We Space’ is, naturally, much different than RD/RD within a ‘Me/Them Space’. That, of course, seems like an obvious thing. And I’m wondering how often I create a ‘Me/Them Space’ by declaring a particular RD/RD that actually may not be serving me (or ‘them’ or ‘us’) best. It feels to me like there’s a sort of dynamic feedback loop involved. A shift in RD/RD can shift us into or out of ‘We Space’ or different degrees of intimacy within ‘We Space’. So, how do I know if I’m creating a ‘Me/Them Space’ or avoiding a ‘We Space’ by my insistence on a certain RD/RD? I see the benefit of a ‘Powerful Pause’ to invite ‘Clarity’.
It’s been obvious to me for some years now that an intimate ‘We Space’ is often a very threatening thing to me…and how for many years I used alcohol to soften that boundary and shift my sense of RD/RD to being more capable of navigating comfortably in ‘We Space’ a little bit more. And then later I would not only suffer an alcohol hangover but also a ‘Vulnerability Hangover’. I can see how that was born out of my early life within my family. The feeling of ‘We Space’ was very uncertain and often lonely for me which kept me in ‘Me/Them Space’ a lot of the time. So coming within proximity of ‘We Space’ can be a strong invitation to step into ‘Primitive Brain’ reactions…deep feelings of uncertainty and danger…and the response is to set a RD/RD based on those Primitive Brain evaluations. In fact, if I understand correctly what ‘We Space’ means I would say that when in that state of mind I’m not actually capable of being in ‘We Space’ at all but am keeping myself in ‘Me/Them Space’ because that’s where I perceive safety to be.
I am finally understanding RD/RD more! And with several people too. For instance I have a long time friend of over 30 years and I am exploring how much RD/RD I want with this person. I tried to explain something to her and she took it as blame and would not communicate about it, preferring to just push it away. To her it sounded like I was blaming and maybe I was without realizing it. We did not chat for awhile until she decided she likes me but does not like the blaming. I tried to suggest we discuss and communicate but she would hear none of it. So at the moment she cannot decide if she wants to use messenger anymore and now she’s emailing. I’m on pause and reflecting. What do I want? How can I get the we space more comfortable? How much RD/RD do I want anymore? I don’t know and that is ok for now or maybe forever. I don’t know. She triggered me and I triggered her. She has no interest in growing. I have to and WANT to!
Seems like there’s a lot of “are the ways you are triggered and then co-regulate compatible with the ways I do?” going on for so many of us right now!
There’s someone I really care about but when they are triggered or connect strongly to a past trauma where I was involved seem to need a lot of processing. And yes, I am all in favor of processing! I did some processing around my eye just last night and today!
And… what are our limits? What do we very intimately “have time and energy and heart for” in our life right now?
I’ve been struggling with RD/RD with a long time friend who is also an alcoholic. He can be a real asshat when he’s had too much to drink, and at one time he promised not to drink around me anymore. That lasted two weeks because he can’t NOT drink.
Last time I saw him, I asked him to leave for an hour because there was a Circle call, and when he came back 90 minutes later (he’d gone to the bar down the street) he was slurring.
He proceeded to pick a minor argument with me, which was irritating, but mostly I realized I don’t like him when he’s drinking.
AND
That he’s a diminished version of himself AND how disconnected and lonely I feel when he numbs out and he’s there but not there.
I’m currently not contacting him to ask him to get together, but I’m not sure where to go from here because he’s not going to stop drinking.
I also can’t imagine tossing a 7 year friendship, but I don’t feel good around him anymore when he’s drinking, which is most every time I see him.
RD/RD doesn’t have to be a constant with each individual. You don’t have to ‘set it and forget it’…(in most cases)…so “tossing a 7 year friendship” would be a ‘set it and forget it’ sort of response. Is it possible that RD/RD with the sober version of your friend can be very different from the ‘altered’ version of him. And that can even be a discussion with him I suppose.
What a challenging situation, @gibbysan – I’ve been there. It’s a common topic in private sessions as well.
With some alcoholics, we can be honest. “When you’re sober, the person you are is someone I can enjoy being with. When you are not sober, we really do not connect and relate in ways that are a YES for me. Are there times of the day and week where you really are sober and can gladly stay that was for an hour or two we might enjoy time together?”
It’s honest. It’s a Better Boundary in my opinion. It says the sober version we have a friendship with. The drunk version we do not.
I’ve said this to people who microdose psychedelics in a way that impacts my capacity to connect to them – even if it might help them feel more connected to me!
People need to cope, and sometimes that means drugs, alcohol, or other behaviors that RD/RD for us means more distance less depth. RD/RD also can mean very selective filters on when, where, how we connect.
I have a longtime close friend who went through a cocaine and heroin addiction. I’ve not been in contact, have some pretty core time and healing milestones I’d want to see before spending time even over Zoom together. There’s still… love and friendship. RD/RD does not preclude having even mutual love and respect for someone’s challenging journey even as we set physical and soberness boundaries.
(How the other parties react to our boundaries and distance we don’t control and can be… a challenge.)
I believe that when I am in my primitive brain, I am a different “person” than when I am embodied, grounded, and present. Which do people I love… love?
Pretty sure if I was predominantly in my primitive brain, most people who currently choose to be close to me would need more distance – even a LOT of distance.
If I drank a lot I doubt my partner would be with me. Hell, I don’t think I could be with myself!!! I’d be a different person – my Dad was multiple people depending on the we-space and his biochemistry.
Hi Rick …so much good sense in what you have written. I also have flexible boundaries…more like what Glen said …that today’s ‘no I can’t help you/ be with you today’ can become a yes tomorrow…
My own sense and spiritual experience is that I am, indeed, still connected to those I’ve had a relationship with. Perhaps I don’t feel it or ever think about it if the relationship was fleeting – a moment or a single session.
Yet, for those I’ve come to love – ever – yes, still there.
The right distance right depth has changed, for oh so many of these relationships. While I could feel sad about that, and sometimes do, it also leaves room for those who are currently close and deep with me.
“…because it is a threat to the control they want over your life…”
Notice how people get dis-regulated when someone they feel they NEED to control is going their own way. Wow.
Right Distance Right Depth invites us to notice the people in our world and how they enhance us or, in this quote, even seek to trash what we’re guided to do and be because it contrasts with their vision of us (or what they NEED from us that they don’t feel confident they can source elsewhere).
Some people walk around NEEDING to control others. There’s a sense of safety if they have someone they can boss around. One reading of this is that in their primitive brain they NEED to feel they at least have status OVER SOMEONE!
Eeek!
It’s core to primal behaviors. It isn’t, most certainly, grounded in thriving or emotional freedom.
Giving yourself more distance and less depth (such as less sharing what matters to you with them) can free up a lot of energy that person or situation requires in order to protect our psyche (and heartistry).
I was raised by someone like this - my mother. Would you believe that in my 20s I was somewhat like this too? My primitive brain was so totally unregulated that I felt like I knew what other people “should” do. I’m glad I found other ways and hope I’m not doing it anymore. Or if I am, please tell me.
i have been ‘puppet’ almost all my life. Indeed enjoying it. So much i ‘worshiped’ the controller in my life. its been an obligation exchange relation rather, as you speak of in the ‘People Pleasing’ workshop.
Lately since a long time i have been craving for Right distance Right depth in all the contexts that are penned throughout here in these discussions. May be my words were different and feelings/thoughts unclear and here i m finding Re-assurance and Re-affirmation and words that ‘its okay’ to want Right distance Right depth in closest of relation(my sister who has raised me since my childhood as my parents separated when i was small). But i need skills to have it flow as nicely as possible. what’s happening is m being blamed for being non-loving n non-caring etc… etc… and i know my fault, which is, i m not able to convey it correctly. i freeze. And i distance. i remain silent. i know my this attitude is unhealthy, unhelpful …but at the moment i know not better. I want to and need to Re-create my individuality…my identity. Until i learn and actually convey it healthily i’ll have to put up with blames. i love her.i care for her. but…i can’t open my mouth in front of her…lots of triggers happen simultaneously and i get in silent mode.
“Right Depth” includes for me how much I share. There are people who perhaps I’d LIKE to share a truth with and I… go silent. I don’t speak it. I don’t share my most real and vibrant intentions.
Is that a bad thing?
I’ve decided for me it is a Good Thing. It respects me. It says that I am wise enough to recognize – often with surprising accuracy! – who I can share with where the sharing will enhance my life… and who/when/where I cannot.
It’s why I cultivate relationships with my spirit buddies. It’s why I cultivate practices like tapping out loud my truth when no one except the Divine can hear. I write in my Love Journal truths about what I most crave and perhaps just hint at them with most others. With some they are obscured, because the depth of me is not where everyone can (or wants) to go.
Remembering that during childhood, good parents will feel at times OBLIGATION is what gets them to tend when they don’t want to. I sit here this morning with the headache and want to be outside in the intense cold. Instead, I am tending to Adira so my partner can have some solitude time herself before the boy returns from his Dad today.
Unless I am truly mindful with myself, my survival brain asserts that I am obligated. And on the level of survival, I am. On the level of my heart and deep devotion, it’s “I get to be with her” and deepen our dance of life and laughter.
I can feel how often my Mom, raising two boys almost on her own would radiate “I have to…” energetically. I responded to that with my own Have-To’s of being a Good Boy, Helpful, Supportive, Strong.
Changing those kinds of ingrained dynamics benefits from tenderness and right distance right depthing. SILENCE can be deep! We can hold our tongue while at the same time feeling the depth of care we have. We can even hear someone’s distress and unmet needs come out as blaming… and remind ourselves that blame is a more primal emotion of needs not being met. Doesn’t mean we have to meet those needs… or that we’re obligated to.
Hmm. Thanks for the engagement. I am curious how this resonates with you and how you’ll refine it for your life. ~Rick
Like Tanvi, I too sometimes freeze, distance and become silent as I’m trying to establish Right Depth and Right Distance with family members. I so appreciate your perspective that going silent can be a Good Thing that respects me! I feel so much better knowing there’s not something wrong with me and the way I’m looking for RD / RD.
This is where disturbance feels most often- as at times i do feel depth of care and other times helplessness at inability to reply and yet other times angry at her, resentment too and then there’s worry about her wellbeing n her health. And yes, partial of these is real(gratitude) and partial is to pay back (under obligation). m on way way to discern what’s real and mine and what’s the part of layer of obligation stuck on me and needs discarding. Its so difficult to ‘experience’ gratitude when it’s seen(experienced) disguised in obligation. As you so wisely say being in primitive brain n mindful.
Part of being in primitive brain is also not being sure of myself. In the beginning of your post as you are giving assurance of not being wrong by keeping quiet; rather its respect is reassuring. I had thought i m running away by keeping quiet. which may indeed be true at primitive level. but looking at it with this your given perspective is so helping. Thank you! Thank You So Much!
"We can even hear someone’s distress and unmet needs come out as blaming… and remind ourselves that blame is a more primal emotion of needs not being met. Doesn’t mean we have to meet those needs… or that we’re obligated to. "
…YES. This is what i remind myself. it takes about 2 to 3 days to subside the concerns after each such ‘talk session’ with her, draining me.
So first thing first - and that is i have copy pasted this entire reply post of yours - to read it again n again, follow it to get more clarity, more processing and conserving my energy and stabilizing my own mood bringing tenderness as you are saying.
She really cares for me and being controlling is her style. i need to only work on my self, continue in helpful direction and lot of benefits we both sisters will reap.
Right Distance and Right Depth is first master key to it. Thank You! God bless you!
