Listen & Don’t Complain
There are two things that I desperately need to learn. I need how to “just listen” and I need to learn not to complain to certain people.
I need to just listen when people are venting to me. I can’t listen to someone tell me how evil someone is to them and then go out and beat up the evil person. I can’t fight battles for other people no matter how much I want to protect them. I wasn’t asked to protect anyone. I wasn’t asked to solve anything. I was simply asked to l.i.s.t.e.n. It’s just so hard! I found myself comparing it to the twins- if one of my sons comes home from school telling me about a bully who hurt them or said mean things, I’d want to go punch that kid and scream at his mom/dad for raising him/her that way. My husband says I can’t do that. He says I’d have to train them how to throw a punch / how to fight. He said they have to fight their own battles (instigating the bully to throw the first punch and then beat the sh*t out of him/her)…are you kidding??? Me not protect and defend MY babies??? That’s how I feel about my friends and family when they tell me about bad things that have happened to them. How do you just listen and give sage advice? Can you really just listen and take no action?
Don’t complain. Did you know that you shouldn’t complain about certain things to certain people? Ok, I’m learning. I’m trying to build my relationship with my MIL- and it’s always been strained (to say the least). So we are playing “friends” and she asks me how things are going and how her son (my husband) is doing with everything. We chatter about and I mention frustrations- he’s not doing this, he’s doing that, he’s trrrrrying, he’s not listening, he’s doing this wrong, he’ll learn eventually…So apparently I’ve crossed the sacred line- you never complain about a child to his mother…her fangs will come out and she’ll bury you. BUT he’s mmmmmy husband and the father of mmmmmmy children….so does she really still have any “ownership?” Ok, I get it- convert it to someone saying something about my babies to me. I get it! I just never ever knew it! I need to work on my relationship BUT that doesn’t mean I can be totally honest with her. We can’t ever be real friends…must learn “arms length.”
Now, you tell me- can you listen? Do you complain?
