Why We Love/Why We Cheat

Why Things Fall Apart

Work-related Problems
Research shows that husbands whose wives worked were less satisfied with their own jobs and lives than were men whose wives did not work. This personal dissatisfaction will naturally lead to negative effects. If the role of “breadwinner” is threatened as it has been defined in the relationship, the relationship is in trouble.

Excessive Intimacy Claims
In most relationships the members make intimacy claims on each other. Such claims may include expectations that the partner will sympathize or empathize, attend to self-disclosures with total absorption, or share the other’s preferences with equal intensity. These intimacy claims often restrict personal freedom and may take the form of possessiveness. To be always responsive, always sympathetic, always loving, always attentive is more than many can manage. In some relationships, the intimacy claims and demands are so great that the partner’s identity may be in danger of being destroyed.

Financial Difficulties
Money is so important in relationships because of its close connection with power. The breadwinner wields the most power within the relationship. This person has the final say on large purchases or even a measly allowance. This power can spread from money matters to relational matters very quickly. Men and women look at money differently due to inherent relational or content dimensions. Anyone who’s ever built a house together can attest to this.

Relationship Changes
Changes in behavior may create difficulties. If you once devoted lots of time to your partner and to the relationship and now are totally absorbed with business or school, your relationship is going to face significant repercussions. The person who develops an addiction to chemicals, alcohol, the internet or even Pokemon will likewise present the relationship with a serious problem.

Sex-Related Problems
Few relationships are free of sexual differences and problems. Most people seem to resign themselves to living with the problem rather than doing something about it. Although sexual frequency is not related to relationship breakdown, sexual satisfaction is. It’s the quality, not the quantity, of a sexual relationship that is crucial. When the quality is poor, outside affairs may be sought and these contribute significantly to breaking up.

Third-Party Relationships
You establish and maintain relationships to maximize your pleasure and minimize your pain. When this ceases to be the case, the relationship stands little chance of survival. These needs are so great that when they are not met within the relationship, their fulfillment is sought elsewhere. When a new relationship serves these needs better, the old relationship may deteriorate. When your need for affection or attention, once supplied by your significant other, is now supplied by someone else (or sometimes something else,) the primary relationship is in trouble.

Undefined Expectations
Expectations over who’s in charge are a frequent cause of relational difficulties. Often, conflicts over who does the dishes or who walks the dog mask resentment and hostility concerning some more serious unresolved expectation. At times the expectations each person has of the other may be unrealistic, and when reality enters the relationship, difficulties arise. For example, in a new relationship, the partners might think they will want to spend all their time together. When it’s discovered that neither one does, each resents the “lessening” of feeling in the other.

Traditional sex-role stereotypes also play into this type of deterioration. Deviations from the expected gender roles within a relationship may reduce the level of satisfaction of both partners involved.

Unrealistic Beliefs about Relationships
The way in which you think about relationships can influence the course of a relationship. Review the handout, “What do think about Relationships” and develop a scene with dialogue that best displays this type of deterioration.

Why We Stay Together

Commitment
Often a relationship is maintained because of promises made. (Imagine that.) Couples involved in relationships with a high degree of satisfaction find a stronger bond of commitment than those couples who do not. Nothing new here, I know, but why don’t more couples understand this? Commitment can be divided into three types:

• Want to – own personal desire
• Ought to – moral obligation due to promises made (covenants)
• Have to – there’s no acceptable alternative

How can commitment be maintained? Identify the types of love that might be involved with this reason to stay together.

Convenience
Both partners may be involved in a business relationship, making this the foundation for their marital relationships. In this case it may be more convenient to stay together than to break up and go through the difficulties in finding another person to assume both roles. Neither person is fooling the other in this, and in such cases there is seldom any difficulty. The problem, though, is that they are living parallel lives. Sometimes this relationship can be out of balance where one partner is in it for love and the other is in it for convenience.

Children
Children are sometimes (unfortunately) brought into a relationship to save it. In some cases they do. Parents stay together because they feel it’s in the best interest of the children. In other cases, children provide a socially acceptable excuse to mask the real reason – convenience, financial advantage, fear of being alone, and so on.

Fear
Fear of being in the outside word, of being alone, facing other singles or going back to the singles game, or even making it on one paycheck is a reason why people stay together. As a result they preserve their relationship an alternative to these other options. Sometimes the fear may be of social criticism that they couldn’t keep the relationship together. Sometimes fear results from the consequences of violating a religious or familial tenet.


Emotional Attachment
Often a relationship is maintained because you love each other and want to preserve your relationship. Alternative couplings are not as enjoyable or attractive as the one you’re currently engaged in. Needs might be based on love, but others might not be so positive, such as the need to dominate, or that the relationship provides some type of ego gratification.


Inertia
Sometimes relationships stay together out of the simple principle of inertia, the tendency for a body at rest to remain at rest and a body in motion to remain in motion. Many people simply go along with the program, and it hardly occurs to them to consider changing their status – it’s too much trouble.

Inertia is greatly aided by the media. It easy for individual to remain stagnant in their relationships and search out vicarious form of satisfaction in film, literature, and any more, the internet. In these instances, the actor or characters do all the things the viewer would do if he or she were not so resistant to change.

Non-Verbal Communication

Haptics - Tactile

Kinesics - Movement

• Emblems
• Illustrators
• Regulators
• Adaptors
• Affect Displays

Paralinguistics - Not what you say but how you say it.

Oculesics

• Eye Movement
• Lids
• Pupil Dilation

Proxemics

• Artifactual
• Territorial
• Spatial

Physical Indicators of Escalation
The carotid artery, the main blood vessel that courses through the neck, can display a heavy and escalated heart rate. As anxiety increases, so does blood pressure and heart rate, and often this can manifest in the neck through careful observation.

Other indications of elevated blood pressure can be found in the temples. The discerning observer will look beyond upper manifestations to find a pulse rhythm in the dangling foot of a leg crossed over the other at the knee, a good point to get a pulse baseline without being intrusive.

Escalated respiratory rates can result in hypoventilation, not being able to blow off accumulated carbon dioxide. This may result in pursed lip breathing, heavy sighing, yawning.

Face touching, scratching, behind the ear and the back of neck can indicate an adrenal dump, escalation in anxiety resulting in a flight or fight response. A side effect of this is itching about the face and neck causing the target to unwittingly scratch as an adaptor.

More prevalent in women than men is the rupturing of tiny capillaries, starting in the skin of the chest and working its way up to and through the neck, the result of a pounding heart.

Psychological Manifestations
When the mind is in dissonance, the body can make this manifest through various tells:

Diminishing - Gesturing becomes smaller, limited range of expression with hands and arms.
Detachment - Emotional responses are delayed, separated from their verbal expression.
Delight - Pleasure tells expressed after disclosure of trauma.
Disconnection - Expression in the eyes doesn't match expression in the mouth.
Direction - The feet tell where the body wants to go.

Oculesics: Eye Behavior
Blinking
Blink rates can indicate escalated anxiety or controlled contempt and a range of emotions in between. Normal blink rates range from two to ten times a minute depending on relative humidity and eye moisture. Blink rates decrease when the eye is engaged in reading or watching a screen, down to 3 to 4 times a minute.

A blink rate baseline can be derived by counting blinks per minute at resting or unescalated levels. More accurate blink rates are determined over a period of time, averaging blink rates from at least a half dozen samples.

Increased blink rates in a subject can be a result of escalated anxiety, emotion, or result from excessive eye movement. Decreased rates stem more from the alpha-male stare, the inherent decoy from being detected in a lie or escalation.

Movement
Excessive or dormant eye movement beyond an established baseline can indicate escalation.

Micro Expressions
This discovery of non-verbal human tells is from Dr. Paul Eckman. It was upon his research the show Lie to Me was based.

The concept is that while we may be feeling a base emotion, we may be simultaneously masking that emotion. Think of the powerful influence of manners, or just being nice. Eckman asserts, though, that true emotions can punch through the patina of being nice, or stoic, or feigning interest. These flashes of truth are called micro expressions because they often happen in one thirtieth of a second.

Unlike language used to express emotions, micro expressions are universal regardless the culture. In fact, Eckman's research discovered that primates and other mammals have universal signals for emotion. For humans these emotions are identified as happiness, sadness, fear, anger, surprise disgust and contempt.

Take a look at these expressions from some of my interns:

See if you can identify them.

Chances are you went...

Happy
Sad
Surprise
Disgust
Anger
Contempt

...and you did so based on your inherent ability to identify these emotions. Most of us can. It's when these fly by you at less than half a second when this gets difficult to identify.

What can help is establishing a baseline, or a neutral, like these:

While it's tough to be completely void of emotion, like some of these students, the neutral expression is a reference for the observer to use in identifying other micro expression.

In threat assessment, of all these micro expressions, the one to be most concerned with is not anger,

...it's not disgust,

...it's this one, contempt.

Of all the micro expressions this is the only asymmetrical display. It's defining characteristic - the curled lip raised to one side, the eyes vacant in expression.

Contempt is an evacuation of conscience. When one is evaluated in contempt, their value ceases. When one is contemptuous they're above the obligation of morality, superior to their subject, perpetuated by thoughts that do not consider their subject's value. Contempt can breed vengeance, an escalated emotion common to threatening behavior.

Barriers to Thinking and Communication

Intensional Orientation
The tendency to view people in terms of how they're labeled or talked about instead of how they actually are.

The cure: Extensionalization

Allness
Defaulting to the perceptual influence of implication, assuming one knows all there is to know about another.

The cure: There's Always More to Learn

Fact/Inference Confusion
Basing evaluations on assumptions.

The cure: Time

Indiscrimination
When one focuses on classes of individuals and fails to see uniqueness and individuality.

The cure: Consideration

Polarization
The fallacy of either/or, a barrier of extremes.

The cure: Middle Ground

Static Evaluation
A barrier influenced by the Primacy/Recency effect, the notion that people don't change.

The cure: Observation


Disconfirmation
The disregard of another.

"No more fiendish punishment could be devised than that one would be turned loose in society and remain unnoticed by the members thereof."

The cure: Confirmation

Stereotyping
The "isms..."
Sexism
Heterosexism
Racism
Ageism
Antisemitism
Atheism

The cure: Click on Comments below and let us know what your cure is.

Disconfirmation

How Confirmative Are You?


1. I acknowledge the presence of another person both verbally and non-verbally.

2. I acknowledge the contributions of the other person – for example, by supporting or taking issue with what that person says.

3. During the conversation, I make nonverbal contact by maintaining direct eye contact, touching, or otherwise demonstrating acknowledgment of the other person.

4. I communicate as both speaker and listener with involvement and with concern and respect for the other person.

5. I signal my understanding of the other person both verbally and non-verbally.

6. I reflect the other person's feelings as a way of showing that I understand these feelings.

7. I ask questions when appropriate concerning the other person's thought and feelings.

8. I respond to the other person's requests; answering messages and email, phone messages and letters.

9. I encourage the other person to express their thoughts and feelings.

10. I respond directly and exclusively to what the other person is saying.

The Most Aggressively Inarticulate Generation

Models of Interpersonal Effectiveness

Humanistic

Some call this the soft approach. Given the axioms of communication, you might call it relational. There are five qualities to this approach:

Openness

Willingness to self-disclose
Reacts honestly and directly
Owns standpoint

Empathy

Avoid evaluating
Soak them up
Identify emotions

Supportiveness

Descriptive v. evaluative
Provisional - Open minded

Positiveness

Attitudinal
Genuine v. patronizing

Equality

Should & ought

Pragmatic

Some might call this the hard approach. Five qualities include:

Confidence

Take initiative
Control emotions
Avoid paralinguistic faux pas

Immediacy

Proximity
Feedback

Interaction Management

Agreement with verbal and non-verbal expression
Savvy with turn cues and facilitates
Self-Monitoring

Expressiveness

Active listening

Other-Orientation

Consideration
Confirmative
Agreement
Allows expression

Tale of Two Brains

Lunch Date

Influences on Perception


Implicit Personality Theory
If someone shows characteristics in some areas, it's assumed they have similar characteristics as well.

• The silent bum. His personal hygiene contributes to the implication that he’s deficient in other areas as well.
• The man is unshaven, hygienically challenged, and (illiterate or self-sufficient).
• The woman is proper, well to do, and (open-minded or assuming).

Self-fulfilling Prophesy
The Belief Stage

• Once her stimuli was organized the lady may have believed, “That bum’s eating my chicken salad.”
• And the same with the man when the lady sits across from him, “She’s gotta be hard up.”
  

Acting on the Prediction or Belief

• The lady confronts the man by sitting across from him.
• The man shares his chicken salad with the lady.

The Prediction or Belief Becomes Validated

• “He’s still eating, I knew he was a bum.”
• “She’s eating my chicken salad, she’s hard up.”

The Prophesy Fulfilled

• “He’s a bum.”
• "She’s hard up.”

Primacy-Recency Effect
The bum is unkempt, spontaneous, funny, intelligent and hopeless.

Stereotype
Prejudices. If you’re a smelly, unkempt, black male somewhere in his forties you risk the stereotype of being homeless.

Attribution
Assigning motive to action. The bum sitting at the table, the attribution is the guy can't pay so he's stealing the lunch.

Disclosures

“When I was little, I ate gum off the ground.”

“I hate cats but act like they’re okay.”

“I put a dent in my neighbor’s truck with a hockey puck.”

“I have cheated on a college test.”

“I said the f-word to a friend when I was mad.”

“I’ve spent too much time ‘on the clock’ at my last job.”

“I was thirteen the first time I tried marijuana.”

“My dad’s an adulterer.”

“I experimented with drugs one time. Didn’t know I was pregnant. Six months later I delivered a deformed, dead baby boy.”

“I was involved in ugly sexual acts under the age of eight.”

A number of years ago I tried an experiment with one of my Interpersonal classes that has since evolved into a practice that I do with all my sections every semester. What began as an attempt to get students acquainted with the idea of self-disclosure has evolved into a study that is simultaneously fascinating and heart-breaking. Each time I conducted this activity I realized even more that I do not fully appreciate the students we teach and the influences they deal with as they enroll in our courses, sit in our classrooms and subject themselves to our assessment as teachers. The disclosures I began with might give you an idea of what I’m blogging about.

Early in my Interpersonal course I address the importance of defining the interpersonal self through a constructivist application of the Johari Window, a model used to illustrate how we might define ourselves through different levels of disclosing information about our selves.

What might sound like an ancient Asian or Toltec method of self-discovery was actually developed by a couple of Stanford professors, Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham in the late sixties. The name of this model is derived from their first names, Joseph and Harry, making it the Johari Window instead of the more sterile Luft/Ingham Window.

The concept of the window is relatively straightforward. Picture a window with four panes. The The X axis of that window deals with what’s known to others and what is unknown to others, and the Y axis (atop the window) is what is known to the self and what is unknown to the self. The convergence of these categories creates four ways to categorize self-knowledge (Luft, 1969). For instance, what is known to others as well as to the self is considered the Open pane. Information found in this pane is open or free to all. We both know that I teach Communications here at Dixie State. By my appearance you know that I’m male, at least I hope there’s no question in your minds about this, and you know that I am, by government standards, Caucasian, non-Hispanic. Anything else would be an assumption and we all know what kind of trouble we get into when we make those. You might be able to predict a few things about me knowing my profession.

Aside from assumptions and predictions though, whatever else you might find in my Open pane is strictly by my choice, by my disclosure, or perhaps someone else’s disclosure. Witness my other pages on this site. Through this you may learn that I’m a film maker, a father, a companion and a cook. Many of you might know much about me through someone else or third-party information, the credibility of which could be the topic of another lecture at another time. Years ago my son’s kindergarten teacher set the rules with us at the beginning of the year by saying, “I’ll believe only half of what your son tells me about you if you’ll believe only half of what he tells you about me.”

Deal.

The scope of the information in the Open window is determined by what we’ve extracted from the pane beneath it. This pane is defined by the content that we know about ourselves but conceal from others. It is appropriately called the Hidden pane. For example, if I were to tell you about the bridge I have on my lower left jaw, I would be in effect moving information from my Hidden pane to my Open pane. This is self-disclosure. Usually self-disclosure is a bit less innocuous than dental work, unless we’ve run out of other things to talk about - a relational myth, by the way.

These panes are dynamic in their scope or size and they change depending on the relationships in which we engage and self-disclose and the time we spend doing so. I have a huge Open pane with my spouse along with a diminished Hidden pane. On the contrary, I have a diminished Open pane with my former spouse and have decided to keep much safely tucked away in my Hidden pane. Generally, I’m a pretty open guy, all you have to do is ask or hang around long enough, as my Interpersonal students quickly find out.

To illustrate self-disclosure to my students, I bring them to this very point in our discussion. (For the sake of this discussion I’ll not delve any further into the remaining two panes of the Johari Window.) I ask them what kind of information one might keep in their Hidden pane and their responses are typical; secrets, behaviors one might be ashamed of, desires, thoughts and feelings, beliefs, vices, and virtues. Rarely does a student identify or describe Hidden pane content in a positive voice. At this point I distribute three-by-five cards, one for each student and I ask them to disclose, write on that card something that exists in their Hidden pane that they’ve never shared with anyone before, or if they’re unusually open, something that they’ve only shared on a limited basis. Most regard me with a look that says, “Seriously?” I just smile and shut up.

While they’re writing, I bring a garbage can up to the front of the room and tell them when they’ve finished to throw the card away in the receptacle. After several moments of consternation on both our parts, students comply and write after a bit of soul-searching, and then come to the can and discard their disclosure. I try not to mention the significance of throwing such disclosures away - the metaphor is rarely lost on these students.

I wait until everyone has had an opportunity to participate. There’s the occasional withholder and I respect their decision to abstain and I move on with the activity. An uneasy air settles over the room. Most eyes vacillate between me and the garbage can. I ask them how they feel and most responses include vulnerable, uneasy, nervous, or better, relieved and happier. I’m always surprised by the contrast.

This is where I take a risk. After they’ve expressed the above sentiments, I empty the contents of the can on a table. I sort the cards, turning them all face up and in the same direction. While I do this you can feel the barometer in the room rise, the pressure is that tangible. More often than not at least one will ask, “You’re not going to read those, are you?” I don’t respond but continue to sort and try not to let them see my hands shake while I do. Once I have all the cards neatly stacked, I hold them up and prepare to read them, but before I do I ask them, “How do you feel now?” It’s rather cruel, I know. Some of you might even think unethical. But the effect that follows is worth the ethical infraction.

“I am depressed. I can’t remember the last time I was truly happy.”

“I am very intimidated by a girl I have a crush on. I mean terrified.”

“I found out that my mom did cocaine.”

“I was raped and got an STD.”

“I wish I were dead.”

“I guess the one thing I could disclose is something that isn’t very dramatic, just the fact that I am scared and really lonely a lot of the time (and) my insecurities are huger (sic) than I let on to others.”

“I don’t know if I want to believe the things I have always been expected to believe about the Church.”

“I have never kissed a girl.”

“I have never told anyone that I weeded my neighbor’s yard.”

“I have been extremely distracted by nudity on TV and magazine covers which lead to searches for real-life nudity.”

“I lost my virginity at age 16 with another man.”

“I don’t think anyone could love me in a romantic way, because I have nothing to offer. I don’t love myself so why could anyone love me?”

“I can’t stand my mom.”

“When I was 10, my mom put me on a diet because she said I needed to start watching what I ate. This led to an obsession with what I put into my mouth. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t look at the nutrition facts on the side of a box or think about what I ate. This led to a battle with bulimia and anorexia that I don’t know I will ever see the end of.”

“I may never live up to the standards of the type of person I wish to marry.”

“I am tired.”

"I kissed my boyfriend more than I really wanted to one night.”

“Sometimes when I babysit kids I can get so frustrated that I want to hurt them. Sometimes I have a hard time stopping myself from doing that, but I always feel guilty for those types of feelings.”

What you’ve been reading is representative of the types of disclosures born in this activity, the breadth and scope of which have always been surprising.

As I read the cards back to their authors, the eye behavior in the room becomes restricted, they’re all either looking at me or at their notes, but no where else. I try to concentrate on the cards in my hands. When I do look out at the class, I see nothing in an attempt to protect the identity of the current card’s author, not from the rest of the students in the class, but from me. It’s the least I can do. Occasionally I’ll come across a card that allows everyone to breathe for a moment, like, “I almost had sex,” or “I hit a car in a parking lot and didn’t leave a note.” Everyone in the room almost wants to say, “You too?” The experience is oppressing, but at the same time the enormity of what one withholds and the relief that one can feel in the disclosure of the mind or heart or soul - however you want to qualify it - eclipse the oppression.

After the last card is read there is a tangible relief in the room. I’ve always found it impossible not to be affected by what I just read back to the class and it takes me a few moments to pull myself together. Composure regained, I ask my class again, “Now, how do you feel?” Their sustained silence usually makes me nervous, because I can’t ignore the danger that lies in this activity. I’ll stay quiet until a response is offered. Usually their earlier feelings are reinforced. I’ll get an occasional “betrayed” or “I’ll never trust you again,” but the overwhelming response is, “I don’t feel so alone,” with a popular, “I’m more fortunate than I thought,” and the relieving, “I just want to give everyone a hug.”

I’ve collected over fifteen hundred disclosures and have analyzed their content and have tried to organize them into different categories; academic incompetence, infractions of integrity, fear of disclosing, fear of losing a loved one, relational abandonment, sexual indiscretions, spouse or partner abuse, fear of remaining alone, fear of sex, use of illegal substances, addiction to internet pornography, attempted suicide, fear of failure, no identity or meaning, depression, rape, doubts about religious beliefs, convictions about religious beliefs.

Instead, then of studying them by content, I decided to look at them from a standpoint of intent - why did this person choose to disclose this item over any other in their Hidden Pane? What could they gain by disclosing it anonymously, and what did they risk if they were found out? With this perspective I culminated six different intents of disclosure, at least among students enrolled in Interpersonal Communication at Dixie State College.

Of course, not every disclosure could be qualified, and it’s obviously my interpretation of the intent of the person doing the disclosing, but a clear pattern emerged from this stack of cards that can be seen as Discreet Disclosure, Dark Disclosure, Penitent Disclosure, Fearful Disclosure, Relational
Disclosure, and even Beautiful Disclosure.

Discreet Disclosure

Discreet Disclosure relies heavily on the anonymous nature of this activity. Persons feeling a risk of judgment due to their particular disclosure have the opportunity to air their burdens that might otherwise brand them or cause them a lot of trouble in their family contexts. This information that one might never disclose to another finds freedom in anonymity. There is a common thread in these revelations:

“I was molested by a close family member when I was six years old.”

“I was raped at the age of eight years old.”

“I was molested by my brother when I was little.”

“I was sexually abused when I was a child.”

“I was molested by my step-brother when I was nine years old. He was never prosecuted.”

“I was molested by my two older cousins from the time I was about four until I was eight.”

“Despite the doubts I have or rather pretend to have about it, I know in my heart that my brother did molest me when I was young, And although I forgive him, it will take me a long time to forgive my dad who didn’t believe me when I told him, so he sent me to a therapist to figure out what is wrong with me. He’ll never know how that made me feel.”

“From the time I was six years old until just this last year I have been sexually abused and have always been afraid to say anything. I have withdrawn myself from people, lost trust in people and have tried to escape my life a few times.”

“I had a sexual encounter with a guy.”

“When I was younger I engaged in homosexual behavior with my best friends and with my cousins. I didn’t know it was a wrong way of satisfying that urge at that young age. I always have that in the back of my mind and hope that I can be forgiven of that so I can move on with my life.”

“I am in favor of gay marriage.”

“I have gone to therapy for depression and have gotten over it, I feel it coming back again.”

“I take Zoloft medication.”

“I have social anxiety disorder.”

“I have depression.”

The first time I came across these kinds of discreet disclosures I realized how much I’ve discounted the life experiences of my students and have since tried to become more aware of what one brings with them into my classroom.

Penitent Disclosure

Theologically, disclosure has been a manager of guilt and a way to absolution. In Christianity, to invoke the Atonement, the sacrifice and the resurrection of Jesus Christ for the redemption of one’s sins and their salvation, one is obliged to disclose their transgressions, to God, to an ecclesiastical authority, to the congregation, or to the person one may have sinned against. The relief of forgiveness and the burden of guilt seem to be the rewards for such penitent disclosure, an effect that is also felt in the classroom during this activity:

“I stole a car.”

“I think I am pregnant.”

“I cheated on a test and lied about it and to this day no one knows but me.”

“I’m ashamed to say that I once stole money from my mom. It wasn’t much, but it bothers me still.”

“In second grade I stole watercolors from the classroom. I did it because the teacher didn’t like me.”

“I lied to my significant other about not kissing anyone else while he was on his mission.”

“I had smoked one time.”

"In my life I have done things that I wish I had not. I have committed some sins and have let a young man take advantage of myself and touch me wrongly. It was scary, afterward I was alone and I knew it was wrong.”

“About a year ago a group of us took a trip to Vegas. We went to a strip club. I was raised to not partake in those types of activities. I am very ashamed that I went and have never told anyone.”

“When I was in high school I got pregnant and had an abortion. Though it would have been really difficult, I regret our decision.”

“I am not a virgin.”

“There was a time when I would commit the deep offense of pornography and what goes along with it. To this day I still have not forgiven myself.”

“No matter how much I try, I cannot seem to overcome an addiction to pornographic material.”

Dark Disclosure

The most disturbing disclosures, at least to me, are those that confess a discounted soul, a student who feels worthless. These are the ones I consider Dark Disclosures for lack of a better descriptor:

“Sometimes I feel as if I am not good enough, or shouldn’t be, for anyone.”

“I have the feeling of being unneeded, worthless, and unwanted.”

"At night I get really down that I sometimes cry, and I am a person the never cries. I keep my emotions in because I’ll feel week if I do.”

“I’m really self-conscious, and I take seriously what others think about me, even though I pretend not to care.”

“I fear that I will never accomplish anything in this life I truly know I want to do. I will never amount to anything.”

“When I was six my mom yelled at me and beat me and told me to never talk, look, or see her again because I was a worthless piece of garbage.”

“I’m often insecure but I hide it well.”

“I’m scared of not succeeding. I’m terrified of messing up and not being someone special.”

“I am afraid of rejection because of my past.”

“Sometimes I wonder if I will ever have someone love me like I love them.”

“Sometimes I don’t think I am worthy of things I have received. I feel like they are wasted on me.”

“I have had times in my life when I believed that if I just ended it all, it would be easier and better for those around me.”

These are the disclosures that make me want to search the room and find the eyes that conceal those feelings of not being good enough. No one should feel this way, yet it is this intent of disclosure that dominates all the rest in these cards.

Fearful Disclosure

Most of us seem to suffer from some type of fear. For emphasis, I left a few redundancies:

“I am scared to be alone.”

“Fear of non-acceptance.”

“I have a fear of rejection and being alone. I want to be loved forever.”

“My deepest fear is being alone.”

"I am scared of the future and what it holds for me. I am not looking forward to working every day of my life, of who I will marry, if I will be looked at as a success or a failure, and not knowing what tomorrow will bring, happiness or sorrow.”

“I am terrified of the future.”

“I am really scared because I have a feeling deep down inside of me telling me that I will never get married. Deep down, I believe it.”

One can’t ignore the social and cultural influences of these fears. I believe this should serve as a kind of wake-up call to all of us who have influence with our young people.

Relational Disclosures

Like Discreet Disclosures, Relational Disclosures are aired under the luxury of being anonymous. The difference for me was the strong pattern of disclosure about this subject in every class where this activity was conducted, a pattern that includes the kind of regret that the discloser cannot seem to escape:

“When my mom was sick and in the hospital there were nights that each of us girls would stay the night with her. When it came to be my turn I was so bothered that I had to do this. Before my mom fell asleep she told me thank you for staying with me.”

“My father is an incompetent dad. He can’t hold a job and he drinks and lives with my grandma. He is a freakin’ bum who mooches off of society.”

“I didn’t kiss mom goodnight when she wanted me to because I was mad at her the night before she died.”

“Dad’s an alcoholic.”

“I always hated my relationship with my mom.”

“I am afraid that one day my mom won’t be there for me anymore.”

“Hate my dad.”

“I miss my dad.”

“I don’t like the fact that my parents spoil me. I am ashamed because of all that my family has. I want to work for what I get rather than have my parents give me everything.”

By this point, you probably can’t escape the heaviness of these messages, the oppression that I spoke of earlier. Some of you may even want me to stop. This isn’t an easy thing to attend, to listen to the thoughts, feelings and fears of the hearts of our students.

Beautiful Disclosure

There are disclosures that inspire, but their infrequency is a symptom that cannot be ignored. These bright spots in such dark disclosure have hope and kindness, such as the humble confession of an anonymous Santa:

“Every Christmas my family thinks of a less fortunate people and we play secret Santa to their families. We will set things on their doorstep and ring the bell and run away. We would do this for four days before Christmas. They never knew who it was.”

And then there’s the one student who expressed satisfaction with whom they have become. One out of fifteen hundred.

“I believe that I am an amazing person and that I will have the opportunity to do something truly outstanding.”

You can’t ignore the tragedy of how few beautiful disclosures there are amongst the others, a symptom that I believe we need to recognize and somehow treat in our educational process.


I’m interested to know what you think. Would these disclosures vary in a different cultural context?

Axioms of IC

Package of Signals

Symmetrical/Complementary

Series of Punctuated Events

Inevitable

Irreversible

Unrepeatable


Content/Relational Dimensions

The Third Word

For as long as I can remember I've been told that I'm lost, or that I am searching for happiness or peace. And somewhere along the line I agreed, probably when I was very young, probably in Primary. As a child I don't ever recall feeling lost, and all in all, I was pretty happy. I had a reasonable foundation in my childhood home - I felt secure.

I wasn't born in the covenant. My mother was a devout Lutheran and my father an apathetic Mormon until much later in his life. Being male I defaulted to Mormonism. They raised me by the golden rule and introduced the idea that I needed a savior for the bad things I'd end up doing. The church picked up where they left off. Once I agreed to this I learned so many more of my shortcomings, that I wouldn't be peaceful or happy, that I'd be lost unless I did what the savior's broker asked me to do.

Who am I? Where did I come from? Why am I here? Where am I going? Listen to the dogmatic implications in hymns, literature and rhetoric from the pulpit and in the classrooms. No wonder we wonder. And no wonder we subscribe to such notions when an institution claims to have the exclusive answers.

Ironically, my break from this ideology was rooted in the name of the person I used to worship; Jesus, the great I Am. His name is him. Its biblical etymology stems from the verb to-be, the first-person singular conjugation of the verb, I am.

I am. Period. I exist. I'm not lost, not found, not good, not bad, not __________ . I am...

I think it's that third word that gets us in trouble. As a child I pretended many adjectives, but when my head hit the pillow I returned to who I was.

What a remarkable equalizer; I am. I am white. I am Mormon. I am fat. I am old. I am straight. I am right.

We mistakenly think we are hungry or we are cold. In French one would say, "I have hunger," or "I have cold." One simply can't be hungry. Even admitting one's own name is done by saying, "I call myself _____." In our language we readily concede that our name is what or who we are. "I'm Eric." I'm not. I just am. We just are.

I'm not lost, I just am. I'm not happy, I just have it, or better, I have chosen to feel it. I have only been lost in my thinking that I was, or in my agreement that I was.

Certainly there's the inherent question, isn't there more to this? "The thought that life could be better is woven indelibly into our hearts and our brains," writes Paul Simon in his song Train in the Distance. But, is this question something we're born with?

All I'm sure of is that religion capitalizes on that question and holds us ransom while we define just what that third word might be. Forget the third word and work on being and the power to ameliorate yourself evolves from within.

Credo

Students often ask what I believe, where my values are rooted.

What follows below states my credo better than I could:

Were life a gift, we have an obligation

Were love a magic spell, we need a rite;

And were all truth for us, one with illusion,

We have a need for someone else’s sight.

Were there a door to life we could not open,

Who kept it closed might ask us for a fee;

Were heaven held, as by incorporation,

No doubt its stock would not be wholly free.

It is our fear that gives away our freedom;

It is our doubt that keeps full love away;

Our willing ignorance prevents our wisdom;

These are the only costs that we must pay.

-Thomas Paine