I agree with Mari! I think our society has been so focused on recognizing and releasing patterns of "co-dependency" that we've forgotten to lean into its alternative- co-regulation. We indeed, heal in deep realtionship with ourselves and others.
As far as community goes- I'm curious how we can build authentic communities online in spaces like this? Thriving, vibrant, creative and collaborative communities that reach beyond the screen? I'd love to hear examples and ideas from others!
I felt this in my bones... "It feels so much more appropriate to pass by tattered paper snowflakes and charity Christmas tree sales than backyard BBQ parties and packed beer gardens."
A really thoughtful post. I have so many things swirling in my brain now. I love when you referred to a relationship as a micro community. I think it starts there on the micro level. The word community is so lofty and load with implication. I know I feel a sense of community by simply knowing my neighbors, not on a deep intimate level, but knowing them enough to make small talk outside on a sunny day. That brings me comfort. Then of course there is the deeper longing I have for that intimate sense of community. I think that starts on the micro level as well and isn't built over night. I've been reading Shannan Martin's new book, Start with Hello and I'd recommend checking it out!
Wishing you the best. I know all too well those dark, heavy winters.
Mari, condolences. I'm so sorry you are journeying down sorrow's road.
Re your column: I have so many thoughts, I'm sure I'll forget one or imprecisely state them, but ...
One, I see the "walk away if he hasn't had therapy" as a litmus test. Is this person open to therapy? Great, he or she is worth the time to get close to. If they never have? How did they get to this age and not think they needed help, ever? Yeah, I'd pass on that one, too. My husband and I each pursued therapy independently prior to meeting and it was a plus when I was considering getting to know him. Maybe the stuff you've seen is more flip and more judgmental, but that's how I read those.
Two, boundaries. Oy. My mother likes to know EVERYTHING about everyone and blunders around asking too many questions and she's 91, no one is going to tell her she's rude. She says, But I just want to know! And here's where the crux lies for me - how do those questions make others feel? If I know them well, the boundaries of what is appropriate to ask or say are lower than people in the grocery line. My mom says, If I don't say it, you won't know that (you look terrible, etc).
Two point five: Irish walls - fun fact, which you might know, those walls are "dry" or free of mortar in order for the farmers to kick them down easily to change their fields. They move the sheep or cows or whatever from one pasture to another, speedily. And they can throw the rocks back up in a minute, so the herd is safe again without too much of their time not watching them. (Too many plural pronouns, probably confusing.) Anyway, I think this emphasizes your point, that lower, easier walls are preferable. Manageable boundaries, not prison walls.
Two point seven five: Ever read The Secret Garden? Child bored and lonely within the austere property lines of an unfriendly and unfamiliar home, but she finds a way to overcome the high, forbidding wall to befriend another lonely, isolated child and they both bloom. Your post reminded me of that book. I need to go reread it.
Re bragging - I think it's fine as long as you keep an eye on how your listener is feeling. Some of our circle might be thrilled for us; others might feel diminished. Maya Angelou's "people remember how you made them feel" and all. It's okay to feel proud of ourselves, and talk about it. Mindfully.
Last - community - I think I mentioned this earlier here once, but my community is drastically changing right now and I'm turtling. I'm folding in upon myself and re-gauging whom I trust and how I make friends and why. Who I'm presenting myself as being. Big questions. So your post is a nice reminder that we DO need others and while it's safe in here, I need to reach out more.
Thank you for your posts and your community and this safe place. Your columns are always so thought-provoking and vulnerable and open. Lessons galore.
First of all, my heart reaches out to you while you're hurting and your close one is hurting. And I pray and plead with the universe for full recovery – for both of you. It really IS a sorrow-soaked time to be in a hospital, to be in pain, to be lonely. Please continue to grab on tight to those who extend their hands.
Secondly, you've built a lovely little micro-community here. I see so many humans pour out their hearts in the comment section — myself very much included — because you strike such a chord in us with your words, your vulnerability, your loyalty, your pure soul. We may be strangers, but I wouldn't doubt that your readers feel like we could be best friends if we all lived across the hall. We'd all be over in a jiff with hot cocoa, those giant marshmallows that are the size of the mug, and your choice of wintery, sorrow-soaked LPs or a throwback '90s R&B Banger Megamix.
Light through the stone wall cracks. And love to you, Mari. xo
I appreciate the distinction make between boundaries and walls. That’s a helpful nuance. Setting boundaries inside and as part of a relationship is the harder task but completely worth the effort. Communal healing is far harder since it requires tons on trust and the risk of vulnerability. The vulnerable often get crushed. Maybe a community of healing can mitigate our worst individual behaviors.
I’m so sorry about the hard times. I hope you are able to have a meaningful holiday this season 💜 I also so appreciate how you wrote about boundaries vs walls. Spot on. Thank you.
Thank you for this Mari! I'm back home visiting family in Suburbia, Pennsylvania and have been gob-smacked by the profound loneliness of big box stores and chain restaurants and thick walls of commuter traffic. This really hit home.
Oh I adore this piece, especially the part about expecting a future partner to be 100% self-aware and over all their trauma. Learning and growing is lifelong and we can’t expect perfection of ourselves or others.
Thanks Mari. Your writing has been comforting to me in my own current grief and unknowing season I’m in with the day to day of carrying my unborn baby who has multiple health issues and challenges.
I have never been one to isolate, and I’m actually a counselor so I recognize my own patterns- for better or worse, and I’m trying to figure out a balance between helping others, processing and allowing myself to grieve and heal, and also have space for others during these difficult moments. Maybe I will write intentionally about this and how this has been on my mind- yet- going through such an inner battle, it feels harder to do the work community commands. I have always felt the love and need of others physically- bringing soup, sending a card. But when what my heart needs- and what my life’s work is all about is serving others when they are hurting, I don’t know how - except of course to have the energy to say something like “please just be there for my heart, I am in a stuck place.” I don’t know if this makes sense. Just trying to have the courage to do that and reach out and still maintain some semblance of our to my other obligations. You write about how as a society we suck at grief. It’s humbling me to try and say “I don’t know what I need, but I am having a hard time.”
I love this post so much! It is something I think about constantly. The past 6 years, we lived in an intentional community and it changed our lives and outlook so much. It became more pronounced as we moved through the pandemic and political divisions. Orienting ourselves towards our neighbors naturally made us so much more comfortable with the messy in-between, the gray areas, the muddling, the discomforts. Doing that together on a daily basis made us feel so much more comfortable standing in the shit with people we loved who were hurting or celebrating or confused. Dear friends of ours who went through an unthinkable loss always talk about how one of the hardest parts of that journey was how people treated their suffering like a cancer they could catch. I think about that a lot. Anyways, disjointed thoughts to say this is so timely and beautiful and should be shouted from the rooftops!!
I find when I'm able to recognize our shared humanity that there are few occasions when I can't see myself in someone else's despair and confusion. Sometimes, for sure, I see the other person as entirely separate and hopelessly messed up. But more often now than when I was younger, I see the pain at the center of their unappealing behavior. It's a huge relief and goes a long way toward that elusive utopia we call community.
I am enjoying your newsletters, and this one seemed particularly appropriate for me at the moment as I'm doing a lot of thinking about relationships and me in them. As someone who spent most of her life feeling that people were threats, yet almost despite myself (because of myself?), developing relationships anyway, I feel in my bones the wall vs. boundary difference and the deep need for communal work and life. Right now, I'm intentionally developing and being in/with the relationships I have, which mostly involves me trusting people with who I am. I've learned that in order to do this, I have to trust myself with who I am as well.
Thank you again for this post, and may you feel the strength of your community during this season of suffering.
I agree with Mari! I think our society has been so focused on recognizing and releasing patterns of "co-dependency" that we've forgotten to lean into its alternative- co-regulation. We indeed, heal in deep realtionship with ourselves and others.
As far as community goes- I'm curious how we can build authentic communities online in spaces like this? Thriving, vibrant, creative and collaborative communities that reach beyond the screen? I'd love to hear examples and ideas from others!
I felt this in my bones... "It feels so much more appropriate to pass by tattered paper snowflakes and charity Christmas tree sales than backyard BBQ parties and packed beer gardens."
A really thoughtful post. I have so many things swirling in my brain now. I love when you referred to a relationship as a micro community. I think it starts there on the micro level. The word community is so lofty and load with implication. I know I feel a sense of community by simply knowing my neighbors, not on a deep intimate level, but knowing them enough to make small talk outside on a sunny day. That brings me comfort. Then of course there is the deeper longing I have for that intimate sense of community. I think that starts on the micro level as well and isn't built over night. I've been reading Shannan Martin's new book, Start with Hello and I'd recommend checking it out!
Wishing you the best. I know all too well those dark, heavy winters.
Mari, condolences. I'm so sorry you are journeying down sorrow's road.
Re your column: I have so many thoughts, I'm sure I'll forget one or imprecisely state them, but ...
One, I see the "walk away if he hasn't had therapy" as a litmus test. Is this person open to therapy? Great, he or she is worth the time to get close to. If they never have? How did they get to this age and not think they needed help, ever? Yeah, I'd pass on that one, too. My husband and I each pursued therapy independently prior to meeting and it was a plus when I was considering getting to know him. Maybe the stuff you've seen is more flip and more judgmental, but that's how I read those.
Two, boundaries. Oy. My mother likes to know EVERYTHING about everyone and blunders around asking too many questions and she's 91, no one is going to tell her she's rude. She says, But I just want to know! And here's where the crux lies for me - how do those questions make others feel? If I know them well, the boundaries of what is appropriate to ask or say are lower than people in the grocery line. My mom says, If I don't say it, you won't know that (you look terrible, etc).
Two point five: Irish walls - fun fact, which you might know, those walls are "dry" or free of mortar in order for the farmers to kick them down easily to change their fields. They move the sheep or cows or whatever from one pasture to another, speedily. And they can throw the rocks back up in a minute, so the herd is safe again without too much of their time not watching them. (Too many plural pronouns, probably confusing.) Anyway, I think this emphasizes your point, that lower, easier walls are preferable. Manageable boundaries, not prison walls.
Two point seven five: Ever read The Secret Garden? Child bored and lonely within the austere property lines of an unfriendly and unfamiliar home, but she finds a way to overcome the high, forbidding wall to befriend another lonely, isolated child and they both bloom. Your post reminded me of that book. I need to go reread it.
Re bragging - I think it's fine as long as you keep an eye on how your listener is feeling. Some of our circle might be thrilled for us; others might feel diminished. Maya Angelou's "people remember how you made them feel" and all. It's okay to feel proud of ourselves, and talk about it. Mindfully.
Last - community - I think I mentioned this earlier here once, but my community is drastically changing right now and I'm turtling. I'm folding in upon myself and re-gauging whom I trust and how I make friends and why. Who I'm presenting myself as being. Big questions. So your post is a nice reminder that we DO need others and while it's safe in here, I need to reach out more.
Thank you for your posts and your community and this safe place. Your columns are always so thought-provoking and vulnerable and open. Lessons galore.
Peace to you as you mourn.
First of all, my heart reaches out to you while you're hurting and your close one is hurting. And I pray and plead with the universe for full recovery – for both of you. It really IS a sorrow-soaked time to be in a hospital, to be in pain, to be lonely. Please continue to grab on tight to those who extend their hands.
Secondly, you've built a lovely little micro-community here. I see so many humans pour out their hearts in the comment section — myself very much included — because you strike such a chord in us with your words, your vulnerability, your loyalty, your pure soul. We may be strangers, but I wouldn't doubt that your readers feel like we could be best friends if we all lived across the hall. We'd all be over in a jiff with hot cocoa, those giant marshmallows that are the size of the mug, and your choice of wintery, sorrow-soaked LPs or a throwback '90s R&B Banger Megamix.
Light through the stone wall cracks. And love to you, Mari. xo
I appreciate the distinction make between boundaries and walls. That’s a helpful nuance. Setting boundaries inside and as part of a relationship is the harder task but completely worth the effort. Communal healing is far harder since it requires tons on trust and the risk of vulnerability. The vulnerable often get crushed. Maybe a community of healing can mitigate our worst individual behaviors.
I never thought about boundaries vs walls - love this!!!
I am 20 years in and have a therapy-averse partner. The pain of stasis is as wrenching as growth sometimes! Best to you through your shadows.
I’m so sorry about the hard times. I hope you are able to have a meaningful holiday this season 💜 I also so appreciate how you wrote about boundaries vs walls. Spot on. Thank you.
Thank you for this Mari! I'm back home visiting family in Suburbia, Pennsylvania and have been gob-smacked by the profound loneliness of big box stores and chain restaurants and thick walls of commuter traffic. This really hit home.
Oh I adore this piece, especially the part about expecting a future partner to be 100% self-aware and over all their trauma. Learning and growing is lifelong and we can’t expect perfection of ourselves or others.
Thanks Mari. Your writing has been comforting to me in my own current grief and unknowing season I’m in with the day to day of carrying my unborn baby who has multiple health issues and challenges.
I have never been one to isolate, and I’m actually a counselor so I recognize my own patterns- for better or worse, and I’m trying to figure out a balance between helping others, processing and allowing myself to grieve and heal, and also have space for others during these difficult moments. Maybe I will write intentionally about this and how this has been on my mind- yet- going through such an inner battle, it feels harder to do the work community commands. I have always felt the love and need of others physically- bringing soup, sending a card. But when what my heart needs- and what my life’s work is all about is serving others when they are hurting, I don’t know how - except of course to have the energy to say something like “please just be there for my heart, I am in a stuck place.” I don’t know if this makes sense. Just trying to have the courage to do that and reach out and still maintain some semblance of our to my other obligations. You write about how as a society we suck at grief. It’s humbling me to try and say “I don’t know what I need, but I am having a hard time.”
a lot of really great thoughts on healthier ways of relating to people we want to have happy, nourishing relationships with here. thanks for this!
I love this post so much! It is something I think about constantly. The past 6 years, we lived in an intentional community and it changed our lives and outlook so much. It became more pronounced as we moved through the pandemic and political divisions. Orienting ourselves towards our neighbors naturally made us so much more comfortable with the messy in-between, the gray areas, the muddling, the discomforts. Doing that together on a daily basis made us feel so much more comfortable standing in the shit with people we loved who were hurting or celebrating or confused. Dear friends of ours who went through an unthinkable loss always talk about how one of the hardest parts of that journey was how people treated their suffering like a cancer they could catch. I think about that a lot. Anyways, disjointed thoughts to say this is so timely and beautiful and should be shouted from the rooftops!!
Wonderful. Thank you for sharing this!
I find when I'm able to recognize our shared humanity that there are few occasions when I can't see myself in someone else's despair and confusion. Sometimes, for sure, I see the other person as entirely separate and hopelessly messed up. But more often now than when I was younger, I see the pain at the center of their unappealing behavior. It's a huge relief and goes a long way toward that elusive utopia we call community.
Hi Mari,
I am enjoying your newsletters, and this one seemed particularly appropriate for me at the moment as I'm doing a lot of thinking about relationships and me in them. As someone who spent most of her life feeling that people were threats, yet almost despite myself (because of myself?), developing relationships anyway, I feel in my bones the wall vs. boundary difference and the deep need for communal work and life. Right now, I'm intentionally developing and being in/with the relationships I have, which mostly involves me trusting people with who I am. I've learned that in order to do this, I have to trust myself with who I am as well.
Thank you again for this post, and may you feel the strength of your community during this season of suffering.