Teaser: Have you ever just met a couple and you just immediately get the sense someone settled. Like one never lets the other talk or feels the need to explain everything they say, or clarify it. Or have you ever met someone that sees everyone as a threat – or worse as less than them

Today’s podcast

Today we will talk about:

How do the ideas of greater than or less than work in relationships

Who and how does the need for control manifest in relationships

What do we do with this understanding?

Welcome back to the podcast! This is just a Rowdy only podcast but I have been thinking about this idea for a few years now, normally within the confines of relationships – but my friend Dr. Rubin showed me how this also is a large form of internal violence which I had to explore with you all.

As far as the podcast it as been very strong and very steady! First the downloads in the past week have been amazing!  Last week we had a very strong 245 downloads which is one of our best weeks ever, and this week has still been a strong 147. This is also before I was able to interview Dr. Puff from the Happiness Podcast – so if I have any new listeners from that space welcome. So you can also send a text OR voicemail along to the podcast as well to ask questions, or leave some feedback! Please remember you can email me at [email protected] or leave me a voicemail OR TEXT at 860-576-9393. I would love to hear your thoughts!

Also remember to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or if you could please share the podcast on social media, All these things go a long way to making a significant difference for us here at the inclusive activism podcast. Also please subscribe to our podcasts on iTunes, Stitcher, Overcast, Player FM, Pocket Casts or Google Play as these are great ways for me to show “proof of work to potential sponsors”. It would also go a long way in getting my producer Sara paid for her work someday too! It was super cool to have her added voice last podcast

So checking in on my Activism:

Next Week I will be a small group discussion leader for a forum in Late Feb as a small group discussion leader for Chandler Unified School District

Will be spending the next few weekends on Emerging Leaders Retreats starting in March

Was a small group leader Diversity Leadership Alliance on Defamations an Interactive Play!

And soon will be assisting on a Civil Conversation Series on REALationships talking about abuse and violence in all relationships

Also will be starting up some work with Healing Racism in the near future

Maybe speaking at a church in the near future so stay tuned for that too!

Self Care:

Lift X5 a week which has been excellent!

Cardio is at 2X per week This week was a bit off, hoping to get back on track this week tomorrow!

Flag Football once a week but that might wrap up tomorrow unless we find a way to win again

And Meditated for 3X last week which was great!

And have read at night at least 1 times last week

Tank training which is how to train yourself good corrections

Recommendation for Self-Growth – Living Buddha Living Christ by Thich Nat Hahn. Nominated by Martin Luther King, Jr. for a Nobel Peace Prize, Thich Nhat Hanh is one of today’s leading sources of wisdom, peace, compassion and comfort.

Buddha and Christ, perhaps the two most pivotal figures in the history of humankind, each left behind a legacy of teachings and practices that have shaped the lives of billions of people over two millennia. If they were to meet on the road today, what would each think of the other’s spiritual views and practices?

Thich Nhat Hanh has been part of a decades-long dialogue between two great contemplative  traditions, and brings to Christianity an appreciation of its beauty that could be conveyed only by an outsider. IN lucid, meditative prose, he explores the crossroads of compassion and holiness at which the two traditions meet, and he reawakens our understanding of both. “On the altar in my hermitage,” he says, “are images of Buddha and Jesus, and I touch both of them as my spiritual ancestors.”

So on to the podcast for today! The Greater than Less than Theory of Relationships.

First thing: What the hell am I even talking about. What is your greater than less than theory on relationships?

So fair warning I am going to start out really hetero-normative but I promise I will pan out from this start.

First off we have seen this with men forever with the idea of the trophy wife. She is there to look good NOT to talk and to help the man look like the object of other men’s envy. The guy never lets her speak – yet in about 10 years is stunned when she leaves him after she finds herself.

Now this is the again hetero-normative flip side of things. The wife sees herself as greater than the husband. This is happening more and more often. Women are controlling men, but don’t trust them to make decisions of substance. Additional since the men see themselves as less than they become dependent on their wives for the smallest things like knowing the flight schedules, or needing a rundown of their daily responsibilities.

Again this paradigm can exist outside of heteronormative relationships. It happens one someone settles for someone else rather than holdout for what they deserve. It also happens when someone thinks they can “improve” or “save” the other person in the relationship. This is supposed to be your partner your equal – no one in life can afford a project when the chips are down and it is time to rally forward.

Take a moment look at your friends, especially if you are younger than 30 who is the greater than and who is the less than in the relationship? How many people can you find that are true equals in their relationships?

Second: The greater than less than theory of relationships level two perceived need of level of control.  

This additional measure is about how much say or control a person needs in a relationship. This is the amount of say a person needs in a relationship to feel good or comfortable. For example I have a friend that really needs almost 80% say in a relationship. Now I do think he can be with someone who is an equal – but its going to be really rough for that to work as what equal person is going to be ok for only a 10% stake on what will happen in the relationship?

Some folks think 50% – 50% is the goal is both folks are equal. But that isn’t really necessarily the case. Some folks feel more comfortable in control, while other prefer to assess and make suggestions along the way. In my prior marriage I tried for 50/50 but with that I believe I got a bit lazy and only took on 40% at times. For example I didn’t bother to KNOW when my plane arrived and when my plane left – I left that up to my ex-wife. But I think in retrospect I might have been better in a 60% – 40% relationship. Her father was more 75% – 25% in my estimation, and I think she might have been missing some comfort in not needing to be in charge of so many things – especially when my moods would get dark and I would be more irritable.

In my current relationship I see my partner as an equal. But I am still working on getting to a true space of 50-50 with control. A lot of if is I never want to get to lazy again. The other parts of it that I am aware of is that I have some ageism happening within me that I also really need to address. There is a large gap in our ages and I worry about her having too much on her plate, but then again I might not be giving her enough from time to time.

But as you can see there is another layer to this cake of the Greater than Less than Theory of relationships.

Ok so this was interesting but again I listen to this podcast to explore personal leadership through the lens of advocacy for the equity of others – what does this have to do with D, E, and I?

I bring this up here because when I was teaching nonviolence with Dr. Jim Rubin in our Emerging Leaders 2 class he said something that shook me. He said the root of much our internal violence comes from the fact that we see people as better than or lesser than ourselves.

I had always really known of this greater than less than theory I had talked about with my friends, but when this got flattened out to everyone else I immediately saw the brilliance of this. Working Class whites have always been some what played by those in power in that their whiteness is somehow held up as better than other people and other races. This has been used as a wedge to keep people who are held down by and with socio-economic class down.

But looking at the root of internal violence as we either see the people in our lives as better than or worse than ourselves that was very interesting! If we see ourselves as less than the people we love and spend time with it means we don’t believe we are deserving of love or the attention they give us.  We will beat ourselves up if we fail to measure up and constantly think and believe we are not worth their love and attention. When I am at my worst I believe this about my partner.

Now when we see others as less than ourselves we get stuck in harmful ideas like should, and worse have a sense of expectation or gratitude which these lesser people should show to us. When we see people as not being on our level, we dehumanize them you make them fundamentally less that us, which means they can “deserve” less then us. We can be mean or rude to them we can want to create systems and circumstances where they can be allowed to suffer. This hurts us because it makes us a purveyor of violence it gives us the freedom of thinking which allows us to hurt others and rain down violence on others.

See violence begets more violence. When we allow ourselves to hurt others, to treat others as less than OR when we think other deserve more or are better than us we fall into patterns of violence. The most abusive people are people who have experience abuse. They learned that abuse and pass it on to others. Nonviolence can be also learned within as well – when we come to understand each person has a right to exist and deserves love we have the opportunity to connect with that person. They may not choose to reach back – but we have to end oppression period, not flip oppressors. I think nonviolent thinking is the only way to meet these ends.

So both for our own sense of peace as well as creating the possibility of peace in others we have to make certain we see and know every other person is a child of God and is worthy of love.

So in review major points of this podcast were:

SO if this made you think something, if you have a question or even more shocking a critique let me know. You can call me at 860-576-9393

This space is a place to talk back ask me questions, hit me with scenarios of how to react to situations real time. Depending on how good your stuff is I will give it my “first take response” or if it’s good it might be a future podcast!

Also as always if you’re interested in booking me to bring the power of inclusive activism to your organization you can always do so at [email protected] or you can learn more about this organization at www.inclusiveactivism.com