The DHX: The Doughtie Houses Exchange

“Honor any resistance you feel inside yourself.” — paraphrase from a yoga video

What if we applied this to our stepfamily situations? In yoga it’s important to honor the resistance we feel because we need to be careful not to injure ourselves while stretching, and because change and trasformation happen gradually. (I’m an occasional yoga video watcher and yoga class attender — full disclosure here — I’m no yoga master!)

In our stepfamilies, I think it’s important because we need to figure out what we can actually do — what we can give and how we can stretch — genuinely, from the heart, in a life-enriching way — and what will make us snap. If a certain kind of flexibility isn’t there, forcing things won’t make it be there. It will likely make things worse. So what if, in our stepfamilies, we were to honor any resistance we felt inside ourselves about our stepfamily situations? What if we let go of the idea that it meant something bad about us, and instead accepted it with gentleness and love? What if we held and protected that spot inside ourselves tenderly, like a little baby? What if we got to know that particular resistance in detail with curiosity? What exactly is the shape of it? When exactly do we feel it? What needs is it connected to? I think it’s important to resist the temptation to reject it or push through it in big bursts. It’s a signal. What if we could let it in? What if we could gradually learn to decode it? What if we could learn what it means — and what it doesn’t mean? Eventually it may dissolve or loosen up, but we can’t force it to. We can only befriend it, listen to it, and if we want to — if it would take us somewhere we want to go — we can very gently, very carefully stretch it, slowly, repeatedly, over months and years. And if we don’t want to, what if it’s okay if we decide to let it be?