Never been to the GLYS Drop-In Center?
Coordinator Mike Seitz shows you what to expect!
http://youtu.be/ygbFqrDWwak

May_2013_DIC_Cal-revised

February, along with being Black History Month is also the month of love due to Valentine’s Day on the 14th of the month. Given that, you probably think that I should be writing about how to improve your relationship, or what things you can do to make that certain someone feel special in your life. Actually I have written some on that in the past so this month I thought that I would give some attention to loving yourself. Where is he going with this you wonder? What does loving yourself have to do with Valentine’s Day let alone with forgiveness?

Isn’t forgiveness all about forgiving people in our lives who have hurt us, made us miserable, made us furious or in some way really messed with us? Well, YES and NO. When people think of forgiveness they usually think about an act of forgiveness in which you let the offending party get out of jail free so to speak and therefore people are often reluctant to forgive. Sometimes forgiveness is seen too as the only thing that you can withhold to keep your footing or your power so forgiveness is that last thing you would consider. Many people would rather get even then get over. While forgiveness can involve an action toward an offending individual, that is not the form of forgiveness I want to address in the space remaining. In fact, the offending party need never know that they have been forgiven, unless of course, we ourselves are both the offender and the victim (more on that in a minute).

Every day we have the potential to be hurt in some fashion by the people around us. And each time it happens we walk away a little wounded, a little diminished by the experience. We are then to some degree mad at the other person and often mad at ourselves for being available to be victimized. These hurts accumulate over time, hurt our self esteem and often lead to one of two conclusions: I deserve what I got (I am bad); or, They deserve whatever bad thing befalls them (They are bad). It may go farther into controlling our life and mobility. Ever get hurt by someone, say for instance dumped, and then be afraid to run into them? So you stop going where they might be and your life gets smaller and smaller and they win again. Being mad and hurt also saps your energy and preoccupies your mind so again you lose! Forgiveness is one way out of this process.

Consider letting go of your connection to the person or the hurtful incident through being mad or hurt and wasting a lot of psychic energy by instead engaging in forgiveness in your own mind. Forgiveness becomes an act of love for yourself to free you from being stuck. Usually people do or say hurtful things because of how they think or feel within themselves so it usually has more to do with them then it does with you! Often in life we can be our own worst enemy and worst critic. Cut yourself some slack, forgive yourself for not always being the brightest, smartest, funniest, prettiest, handsomest, thinnest or what ever …est you happen to be using as the standard of the moment. And maybe most of all, if this applies, forgive yourself for being in a situation or contributing to one where you were hurt, like when a relationship ends or a friend disappoints. In life you have to forgive yourself for not knowing what you could not have known, like an unanticipated or unwanted outcome.

In the realm of relationships, while it is good to listen to your instincts and feelings it is also helpful to check out your perceptions by asking questions and gather information to either support or call into question the conclusions you may be jumping to. Often I hear stories where the person in a relationship gets an idea about something, or “just has a feeling” and acts as if this is THE TRUTH. Grant you, sometimes it is the truth but often enough it isn’t. Take, for example, the person who comes into your life and sweeps you off your feet professing undying love and fidelity. Since you want to believe that “You are the one” you ignore that this person has had a new relationship every month for the last year. You believe that with you it will be different and, overwhelmed by the excitement of love, you through caution to the wind only to wind up in the end (a month later) scattered among the other devastated hopefuls. Often in life it is smart to wait before you act and get more information, to see the forest and not just some of the trees. I am a big proponent of getting a grasp of the big picture rather than reacting to just the details or parts of the picture.

Another example. Suppose that you have been hurt in your last relationship or two and now you are tentatively exploring a new relationship with another person. Because you have been hurt in the past you are on guard against being hurt again. As a result you are sensitive (perhaps overly) to anything that remotely suggests disinterest, lack of sensitivity or rejection. In this example, say that the person does not return your call on a particular night and your reaction is to be hurt and furious as you again relive your earlier hurt. You conclude that this person is a jerk and now all your energy goes into removing them from your life. Your feelings, learned from your prior relationship now contaminate this relationship and literally prevent you from getting more information. But what if a parent of the person took ill and was taken to the ER, or they fell asleep and it was too late to call when they awoke.

What it boils down to is this: Your feelings, while very important, are but one piece of the decision making process. There are also your perceptions, accurate or distorted, your experience in similar situations, context of the situation, history or behavior in similar situations, your general emotional state and so on. Obviously, life is a moving and evolving and we have to size up situations, make decisions and take an action at some point but experience suggests that an informed decision using more than one source of information is usually the better and more successful course. You can always say, “Let me get back to you on that” and buy yourself time to think and not just react.

1. Be the best you can be for yourself and your partner! or, Why unconditional love is a myth you need to get over! or, If you don’t like you why should they?

As relationships age it is easy to get lazy and let ourselves go and take a lot for granted. Sometimes our issues, or perhaps addictions cause us to think less of ourselves and sap energy, time and money from our relationship. We think that we are together for “better or for worse” however many relationships falter and end when the worse exceeds the better. Work on and work out your baggage or you may be left holding the bag!

2. Communication: Once is not enough!
As time goes on in your relationship day to day living can overtake reflective talk ABOUT the relationship. In fact it is not natural to always be routinely self conscious about your relationship. However, periodically it can be helpful to set aside time to talk about the relationship, how it is feeling for you both and your expectations. It is a change to review what is working and to address dissatisfactions and disappointments before they become too embedded in the fabric of the relationship. Think of this as being on a road trip and periodically checking the map to adjust your course and make needed corrections so you wind up where you want to be!

3. Unconditional Affection: Let me show you that I love you!
To my way of thinking affection, the casual touch, a hug, caress or peck on the cheek are part of the connective tissue of a relationship; part of what we cannot provide for ourselves. As such these small but important gestures need to be always present. Sometimes when we are hurt or mad we withdraw affection but this only increases the gulf between us. The resulting increase in tension and disconnection only make the path to resolution harder.

4. Future talk and planning.
It is important for us and those we love to feel and believe that we are a part of the future and not just the now. Make future plans and references that take the idea of being together out into the foreseeable and further future. This suggests a permanence and enhances security and trust.

5. Togetherness/Separateness.
The degree of each of these change as the relationship ages and changes with separateness being more accepted usually once the we/us is firmly established and trusted. Encourage your partner’s individual/separate interests as long as you are confident of the we/us bond. Your partner will love your generosity of spirit and willingness to see beyond your own needs.

6. Spontaneity vs Obligation.
The best surprises (and the ones that are felt and remembered) are true surprises. There are many events that occur in the life of a relationship like birthdays, anniversaries and holidays that are expected to be noted and therefore are remembered if they are forgotten or were otherwise disappointing. What is truly noted are the things that are unexpected and given with no obligation. The little spontaneous gestures of love like a card, gift or flower are what we think of when we consider how we are loved.

7. Rituals: Relationship affirming!
Routines are a part of life and the predictability and familiarity of them are part of the security building in a relationship. Beginning and ending the day together, a regular meal(s) together or whatever the routines are they are some of the more important gifts that a relationship uniquely provides and are part of what define our sense of being TOGETHER.

8. Sex.
Each person in a relationship is responsible for there own pleasure: Knowing what satisfies you and communicating this clearly to your partner is YOUR responsibility. If you are working out of the Crystal Ball or “If they love me they should know” theory it is time to Get Over It!

9. Fun.
Relationships are serious but ought to feel often like fun, like playmates did. Make it happen.

10. Family and friends.
Although these relationships shift during the course of a relationship remember that family and friends where there before, during and after you. You may not like everything about these people but you are not in competition with them and if you play that game you may lose. We pick our partners but then have to live with and accept their luggage. Your partner will notice your acceptance as a reflection of your love for them. The exception to this is when the other party is clearly toxic such as being alcohol or drug dependent and abusive and hurting you or your partner.

GLBT persons have unique challenges and may bring unique resources to their loving relationships that are not shared by heterosexual couples. The social, cultural, legal and sometimes familial supports for our relationships are at best lacking or weak and at worst destructive. Efforts to change the culture and enact legal supports have made some progress but there is also great resistance to, for example, gay marriage. Many GLBT couples date and live invisibly or in the shadows and their concern over discovery or being obvious limits spontaneous affectionate/dating behavior and is stressful to a relationship.

The usual times when young adults are learning how to couple, date, and sort out their feelings about sex and sexual activity occurs in mid to late teens and early adulthood; in high school and perhaps college. Because GLBT youth are often hidden and/or just beginning to come to terms with their own identity their learning curve in the dating department is delayed and often put off to later, producing a disadvantage regarding acquired dating skills. The increasing presence of Gay/Straight Alliances and Cultural Diversity Groups on high school campuses has the potential to normalize the presence of GLBT youth in high schools and ultimately reduce the pressure to hide and be invisible. In that atmosphere GLBT youth dating is more possible.

Men in relationships, whether gay or straight tend to operate out of learned male role behavior. Competitiveness, power/dominance, discomfort/unfamiliarity with being emotionally intimate and/or vulnerable, the over exaggerated need to save face and pride, the need to control, limited negotiation/verbal skills, need to maintain a sense of independence all can interfere with becoming the necessary we/us in relationships. Even male language, top/bottom, dominant/submissive, etc., is indicative of classic male role-playing behavior. So imagine putting two men together with these dynamics and you often get the typical male complaint, “I just can’t seem to find someone who wants to commit.” The problem may not be so much a lack of the desire to commit but more lack of familiarity or practice with the skill set needed to make it work. Men have more difficulty moving from the me/I position to the we/us position.

Women generally possess better verbal/negotiation skills than men. They affiliate more naturally and are less needful of being dominant or independent. These attributes/skills often lead to relative ease with relationship formation. The lesbian joke is, “She came to the first date with a U-Haul!” Women in the general culture are also more stigmatized for being uncoupled and hence are more burdened by pressure to couple. In women’s relationships these factors can make managing differences and tolerating conflict more difficult. So for women allowing for and not being threatened by the I/me issues as the couple moves from the we/us stage to the me/you/us/we stage of relationship can be taxing.

Along with special challenges GLBT individuals can and do bring unique resources to their relationships. Growing up marginalized and figuring out how to cope and adapt to often non-supportive environments can result in creative flexibility and adaptability in the personality. Survival requires learning how to size up a situation to know how to behave. These skills are also useful in relationships when they translate to sensitivity to the other person and adaptability to new or unfamiliar situations. After all, at the end of the day, a relationship is the successful blending of two unique individuals into one unique relationship that affirms the individuality and the coupled-ness of both people.

When we are young, we are fed and usually swallow whole the lessons about how we are supposed to be. Ideas and rules on how our family, our neighborhood, our school, our friends, our church wants us to be. “Act ladylike, be a man, boys don’t cry, that’s so gay.” The process is called socialization but the result is also internalized homophobia. We are continually being taught to fit within the larger cultural context. The intention of the teachers of these norms is not necessarily mean spirited. It is for our benefit, to teach us how to fit in by not being too different from everybody else. To be a girl like the other girls; not a girl who acts like a boy! These lessons are powerful especially as they are being taught by the very family and friends from whom we want acceptance and love. We swallow whole the toxic messages about being GLBT. We learn to adapt, to march to their drumbeat if we can. Inside we start to feel bad, unlovable. We learn to hide our true selves. People usually do not hide what they feel good about. They hide what they feel ashamed of and for GLBT persons that is our own identity.

Even as the culture changes to include more positive images of GLBT persons, which is absolutely necessary and helpful, the power of the negative stereotyping and the messages that we have already absorbed into ourselves persists. It feels like we have two batterers. The world around us and ourselves, as we have more or less come to believe that we are not OK, not acceptable, not lovable, sick or perverted. It is very difficult as a teenager to worry about and work hard at fitting in with our peers and at the same time learn to accept our true internal selves if that self is GLBT. All the harder when we have come to believe that internal self is unacceptable. In the military the current solution for GLBT persons is to remain hidden, “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” While hiding can be a survival technique in certain instances, it promotes the idea that something should be hidden because it is bad or wrong.

Restoring our self-esteem and damaged spirit is the most essential task at hand when we finally admit to ourselves who we really are. On the outside we can embrace Pride and slogans, join diversity groups and access positive information and images about GLBT persons through the media or the Internet. The inside stuff is more difficult and takes longer, but it is absolutely doable. Remember that the mirror that was held up to you is flawed and distorted as it represents what society thinks you should be, not who you are. It does not reflect your real true self or your value. Our cultural teachers (parents, school, peers) are themselves a product of that larger culture and what they learned. Think about what you were told coming up about masculinity and femininity and gayness and reexamine those messages more critically. Channel your feelings of anger and hurt in more positive ways like journaling or seeking out people or places where you feel more accepted. Learn to honor the rightness of your need and struggle to love and be loved. Remember that the cultural teachings (socialization) reflect general culture and overall fit, NOT you and your more specific fit nor your particular value as a person. Over time your value is created by what you do and how you live your life, not by how you fit a general standard of cultural measure.

For me, I eventually accepted that I walked as I walked and that it was neither masculine nor feminine, right or wrong, gay or straight, it was me and that was, no, I AM OK. I stopped beating myself up for what I wasn’t and started loving the self I was; and he is gay!

As we get older, more and more people come into our life through friends and our jobs. In an effort to be proud, open, honest or even to signal a potential boy/girl friend about our reality, it may seem to you to be a good thing to be “out” at work. Frankly, my general answer to this question of being “out” at work is “NO!” Each individual and each work situation bring together unique variables. As a result, each situation is very different from the next. Let me explain and offer some things to consider.

Throughout your life, as a GLBT person, you will continually be faced with the question of should or shouldn’t you “come out” as you move into each new experience and the people that come with it. “Coming out” as a GLBT person is NEVER finished because each new environment/person presents us with the issue and the need for a decision about disclosure. So it becomes necessary to study the new situation/person for clues as to what the response may be. For instance, if I went into a church service at a Southern Born Again Christian Church in say, Mississippi, it might be foolhardy to stand up and proclaim my gayness. On the other hand, if I were attending a Diversity Group meeting at my high school I would anticipate that my “outing” myself would not bring negative repercussions.

In New York State and in the City of Buffalo there are laws on the books to protect us from discrimination in the workplace and when renting. But let’s face it, if an employer or landlord wants to discriminate they can find “other reasons” to not rent or not hire or even fire. So, in general, I do not believe that the work place is the place to “come out.” The work place is the place to go, do your work and collect your pay (the primary reason that you are there).

The food service industry in particular has a history of being a place where young GLBT people have sought and gotten jobs. But along side that history is the industry’s long time concern about AIDS and public fear of contamination and therefore fear about gay males in particular. Fortunately this has subsided considerably since the 1980s when it started, but remnants of it still exist in that industry.

Usually I recommend that a person consider “coming out” at work only:
• After being there and sizing up the situation and people for some time.
• If this work site has others who are “out”.
• If you know the history of this company regarding its comfort with and treatment of GLBT persons.
• When you are clear with your reasons for wanting to “come out” at your job and that these reasons are good and justifiable.
• After you have thought through the possible consequences of “coming out” and you are prepared to accept the consequences of doing so.

The loss of a love is very painful, not just because the person isn’t in our life as they were but also our hopes for the future with that person are lost. When it happens once it is easy to feel like a failure. When it happens several times you can start to feel like you belong in the relationship junkyard and that you just will never get it. Certainly there are things that a person can do to help make a relationship get off the ground and continue (This, of course, assumes that it is a good and healthy relationship for BOTH parties and that it SHOULD continue).

The Archives of the Info Page contain a number of entries about relationships. Since relationships are important to us, there are sure to be more in the future.

But relationships during adolescence have a uniqueness that is particular to the teen years themselves. It may well be that relationships during the late middle and early high school years shouldn’t or can’t last. YES, I SAID THAT! Now I will tell you why.

It would be unusual for a person not to want someone special in his or her life. In high school, in particular, all of a sudden everybody seems to be dating and it can be painful to feel left out. There is a fair amount of pressure to date and find someone, especially as you are feeling more independent from your family. For some people having a group of friends fills the bill so that your free time can be spent chatting or going to events together as a group. But many young people want to start to experience romance and feel that they have someone special. This is totally understandable.

Part of the problem though is that high school is a period of considerable change. Physical change to begin with, along with learning more about our own tastes, likes and dislikes and how we fit or don’t fit into the various groups at school. All these changes inside of us and in our environment make a relationship more desirable. A relationship can give us a sense of constancy in a sea of change. But the changes also put a great deal of pressure on our relationships, making them very difficult to sustain, no matter how hard we try. I can certainly remember hoping my relationship would last long enough so that I would have a date for the big sophomore dance! (This was back in the days before I came out to myself).

So, it may be that while it might feel good for our relationships to last in the early years of high school, the odds may just be against it. And it may also be that changing partners and even being without a boyfriend or girlfriend for a while is not a bad thing at all.

You might consider being a little more flexible in your view and definition of relationship. That is, “this one” may not be, “THE ONE.” Try to be a little more open to people coming in and out of your life, or filling some other place in your life. This will allow you to flex and expand your own personality and be better prepared when “THE ONE” does eventually arrive.

Your question reads something like, “Should I be the bad guy?”or, “Maybe if I wait long enough it will get better.” I am not aware of any relationship that really gets better spontaneously. It sounds like both you and the other person have passed the initial infatuation stage. Now neither of you are sure that this is a good fit, but neither of you want to be the one to end it.

I think that for most of us, in our heart of hearts, we really do know when a relationship is just not working, but for a variety of reasons we hold on. Sometimes we hang in there because we don’t want to hurt the other person. Sometimes it is because we fear being alone or being seen as not having a relationship. We have all heard the saying, “Something is better then nothing.” NO! NO! NO! Since when is wasting your time and someone else’s time a good thing? Since when is “not hurting” someone by not really being honest and straight forward and leading them on “a good thing”? People can be uncomfortable being alone, causing discomfort, upsetting someone or dealing with conflict. So we give ourselves reasons not to take action and, in this situation, even secretly hoping or trying to cause the other person to take the action and end the relationship. If you are in a relationship that is going nowhere, allowing it to slowly fade away isn’t good for either of you.

As we start dating and seeking a relationship, learning how to flirt and woo someone into our lives is a skill to be learned and practiced. We spend a good deal of time working on ourselves and our skills at attracting so that we can have a primary relationship. But learning how to let go, to move out of and on from a relationship that is not satisfying or right for us, is also a skill worth learning. I’ll bet we all know a couple that shouldn’t be together, but stays together out of habit or fear. You yourself may have been or be in such a relationship. Taking the initiative to end it is not a bad thing. Doing so and getting practice and skill at ending poor relationships will make it easier later on in life to take care of yourself and not get stuck in a bad, mismatched or dissatisfying relationship.

So how do you actually end a non-working relationship rather then letting it just sort of go away on its own?

One approach is to sit your partner down and state the obvious. “I notice that we seem to be finding less time for one another. As we have gotten to know one another we seem to have less in common then perhaps we originally hoped. I have been thinking that I would like to redefine our relationship as something other then dating; perhaps friends or maybe we might just move on. What do you think?”

If he/she says that he/she wants to continue to see if a spark can be rekindled (and you don’t) then say you have given that thought already and you think it best to part. This may seem selfish but in relationships you have to look out for yourself. If you are really not into your partner…well, letting him or her go has his/her best interest in mind as well. It really is better to be by yourself then in an unhappy relationship. Many people stay in dissatisfying relationships out of fear and lack of practice at leaving. You have to believe that there is a better relationship out there for you, that you deserve better and that it is OK to be alone until you find it. This holds true for the him/her that you are leaving to their own search as well. Do both yourselves the favor of moving on.