Where Neglect Comes From

I ain’t got no book learnin’ about psychology and emotional stuff. I only can relate my own experiences, the experiences of friends, the experiences of those who I have worked with and the people I observe from day-to-day. In my own experience of a failed marriage, I can clearly say, “I didn’t see it coming.” In watching other marriages fail, I sensed that these failures, as well as mine, were due to neglect.
I have been “listening” for a few years for neglect in relationships. I had accumulated a jumble of observations that did not reveal to me the nature of neglect and how it works. The pieces came together for me during an Episcopal Church service. The service had a script – God’s Word – and there was no deviation from it. The Word extolled a single system of belief in Jesus Christ, the Holy Spirit and the Father.
As I listened to the service, I became aware of my own past penchant to treat the world as deterministic – understandable and predictable, really. I sense that this belief kept me in a trance, listening only for things that I could make understandable and were predictable from a logical thought pattern I had developed.
I developed this way of thinking so I could get to where I was going – a financially successful person, a good parent, with a home, a wife and a stable, calm existence. I was constantly striving to attain this success, I guess because it was so elusive or because I wanted to maintain the appearance of having it all.
As a result of being elsewhere with my thoughts, I was not aware of the things that were happening around me. I was also not open to making changes or even to recognize change as it occurred around me. By focusing on attaining something not in my grasp (yet sure it was within my reach), I was not in touch with others or with myself.
We don’t choose neglect directly. It happens when we are pre-occupied with being something other than what we are. I now have faith that I am, at my core, a perfectly formed person (in God’s image). I can be anywhere and listen to this part of me that was unavailable when I was in a trance. Awakening from trance is a vital part of the work we do at http://www.thecenterformarriage.com/.
I enjoy the uncertainty of life now because I know I don’t know as yet who I am in my fullness and richness. I am more cognizant of the emotional quality of my life as I take action in the various aspects of it. I am learning about my self in relationship with others and in a special, intimate relationship where my fullness of spirit is readily accessed and revealed to me.
Yet, I can back lapse into the trance – as we all can. Life is about remembering and forgetting. When I start listening again, I can notice neglect and be open to all that might be there right in front of my nose whether understandable or not. It brings me to a place of freedom where I get in touch to that God within. It ends when I forget by tricking myself into believing things are predictable. Then I remember to listen.
As I age, the periods of forgetting diminish in length until I see the beauty in life again.