When My Clarity Goes off Course
When my clarity goes off course, it can take everyone around me with it. At least that’s sometimes true at my women’s dialogue circle when I’m engaged in a conscious conversation. It’s a conversation built on safety, one that supports the knowledge that my struggles are just an aspect of all that I am, and that the darkest places within me are where my deepest learning can shine.
It’s amazing what can happen when we intend to pay attention, and when we change our “we” statements to “I” ones (as I just did with the above paragraph), owning our own paradoxes and our unconscious coping mechanisms.
When my comments are indirect, I appreciate when others push for clarification. I may become defensive at first. But then I notice that my body feels distress. I’ve come to know that feeling as a signal that I’m skipping over a deeper truth or a past hurt that wants my attention.
This time I recognized that I was muddled. I didn’t understand how the dialogue got where it was or what I defending. It wasn’t long before “the get” came and it came because I was open to it as a practice and not resisting the self-examination it required.
I was muddled because an unconscious pattern was playing out before me. I had over-identified with another woman’s sharing and wanted to protect her by steering the conversation (indirectly) away from any real or imagined feedback that might have hints of fix-it solutions or non I-statements in them. I am sensitive to and have felt oppressed in the past by that approach.
So was it compassion or co-dependency that caused me to feel my friend’s real or imagined discomfort and want to ward off any real or imagined deeper scrutiny coming her way? I think the very definition of co-dependency is when we over-identify with someone else and try to protect them from feeling the effects of their circumstances.
I sat in the full body feeling/knowledge that co-dependency comes from compassion. They are mixed together. I think compassion is an asset that becomes a liability when over-used, or a positive that becomes a negative when acted on unconsciously. And in my awareness of what I learned when I veered from the personal present, I felt compassion for the co-dependent people in my life that I haven’t had much patience for.
This paradoxical understanding was just one aspect of our rich and diverse sharing. It was one that happened in the moment, one I couldn’t have gotten to without the input from the other women present. We were all in it together and I believe that each of us was receiving our own personal form of learning from our collective living exchange.
July 7th, 2014 8:30 pm
This is good, and very deep. I don’t think many will understand it. Missing you as usual! xo
July 7th, 2014 11:43 pm
I’d never really delved into co-dependance, though I certainly have had cause to do so. It’s been a while since I’ve used body tension to guide me, but that is a very effective technique. Food for thought.
BTW, Heather L has been trying to leave comments for you, but keeps getting swallowed. She had problems on my blog too, until I found her in the s p a m filter. Anyway, she’d like to connect if you want to email or anything.
July 8th, 2014 9:04 am
Remind me to never get into an in-depth conversation with you if we meet. I am sure that my flow of ideas is full of all kinds of subtle and not-so-subtle muddling!
July 8th, 2014 9:39 am
Oh, I think we’d converse just fine, Tabor. The Women’s dialogue is a practice (done once a month for an hour or so) and more like a therapy to me. I go into it to share my inner life, listen to and witness others and to learn more about myself and human psychology. It’s not like everyday back and forth talk, which I can muddle with the best of them.
Here’s what Judy O’Brien, founder of Riverspeak Dialogues and the woman who helped spurred our circle, says: The reflection that the dialogue circle provides can be utilized as a fast moving current to move participants to the doorway to a transcendent awareness. Dialogue is talk that moves you forward!
Check this out for more: http://www.capitalgazette.com/lifestyle/dialogue-formal-process-is-more-than-dialogue/article_d069b6e2-080e-5979-a7a2-502f194f0be7.html?mode=jqm
July 9th, 2014 8:10 am
I’ve never heard anyone refer to this before… that over-identification with someone else’s (possible) discomfort. I relate. And thanks for writing about it so well.
July 9th, 2014 10:16 pm
[…] 10. When my clarity goes off course, it can take everyone around me with it. At least that’s sometimes true at my women’s dialogue circle when I’m engaged in a conscious conversation. It’s a conversation built on safety, one that supports the knowledge that my struggles are just an aspect of all that I am, and that the darkest places within me are where my deepest learning can shine. More on my Women’s Dialogue group HERE. […]
October 15th, 2014 10:00 pm
[…] 5. Each of us holds a piece of the whole story and when we are done, the circle is usually complete. It’s diverse, shines with a common thread and extends out onto something larger than ourselves. I think of a dialogue circle as a work of art, made with the honesty of words, personal reflection and listening. – Colleen on dialogue circle. More HERE. […]
July 13th, 2016 9:47 pm
[…] his birthday. But before that it was finishing up a story about four women farmers and going to my women’s dialogue group. After that, it was babysitting my grandsons, meeting them and their dad at the Floyd […]