NLP

Choose your words carefully...

When I was twelve years old, my parents divorced.

It was NOT a surprise. It was my dad’s favorite threat to my mother (who had already been married and divorced once before.) No matter what they were fighting about, if he felt like he was losing ground, he’d come in loud with a solid, “Well, maybe you’d be happier if we just got a divorce…” which would send my poor mom ‘round the bend.’ 

She hated the failed marriage on her resume. It was this “low blow,” that my dad would toss out to end a fight, since it would generally end the discussion about whatever they had been fighting about and make the fight about whether or not to stay married. For his “grand finale” he’d often enhance his threat by tossing in a vague phrase about avoiding the legal fees, storm out the front door and drive off in the car, presumably in search of a cliff to drive off of.

I didn’t keep a running total of the number of fights or the number of times the word “divorce” crept into them as a strategic manipulation tactic. The point is, when my parents finally DID separate and announce their pending divorce, there was almost a sense of relief.

It was like someone FINALLY released this pressure valve that had threatened to rupture through the majority of my childhood. I wasn’t happy about it – but hey – it was the 80’s. At least half of my friends were going through the same thing – so there were plenty of fellow middle-schoolers to commiserate with.

Fast-forward to my own disappointingly short-lived marriage.  (Longer than an average Kardashian pairing mind you…) My ex and I had ONE fight before we got married. ONE. Maybe I’ll tell you about it someday. But the point is, after we got married our first real married fight was rough.  I have no idea what touched it off, but I remember several details.

Among the details I do remember was my ex threatening me with divorce and storming out the front door to go “be by himself” for a while.

If he thought I was going to “calm down” in his absence, he thought WRONG.

Mostly I paced around the house wondering HOW in a world entirely FULL of men, I’d found one who learned his big “finisher move” out of the same playbook my dad had studied. Therefore, it wasn’t until the next day that we were able to have a rational discussion about “rules of engagement” moving forward.

I told him that I’d be more than happy to give him time and space IN the house to reflect on his thoughts, organize his perspective and craft a rebuttal. But I wasn’t going to put up with him storming out the door whenever he got upset about things. I told him it was a terrible way to grow up as a kid, and I would NOT allow him to make that a default for OUR family (that we never got around to building… sigh…) The other thing I put my foot down about was using the “D-word” in our home. I explained how my dad would use it to upset and emotionally manipulate my mother. I told him I wasn’t going to live with threats like that. I told him IF he chose to use that word, that I would take it seriously and I wouldn’t stick around in a home with a man who didn’t want to be with me.

For nearly seven years, no matter WHAT the issue, we held to those rules. We actually worked through a lot of stupid young married couple crap. Until he used the word.

I stopped him. I reminded him of our “deal.” He acknowledged that he remembered the deal. So I told him, again, that if he continued to discuss the “D-word” I would take that as a sign that he was serious about ending our marriage. He continued. And that was pretty much that.

You see – words have POWER. One of my favorite lessons from Genesis is how God spoke all things into existence. “Let there be LIGHT!” And it was good… But many a Bible-study group since has marveled on the power of words displayed in the creation story. All things are created “spiritually” before they are created physically in the realm of Christian theology/mysticism. 

In the secular realm there are endless examples of the same – one of my favorites being when Mike Myers’ breaks the fourth wall in Wayne’s World at the guitar shop to tell the audience, “It will be mine. Oh yes. It will be mine.”

For good and for bad we speak hundreds of things into existence every single day. There’s even a discipline called NLP – Neuro-linguistic Programming that many “gurus” teach to help people achieve success by modifying their speech to modify their mindset. Of course – that’s the “self-programming” aspect of NLP. There’s a much darker application as well - the kind that is used ON people by other people to insert and/or reinforce ideas in the minds and realities of others. Think “Inception,” only it doesn’t happen while you’re asleep. It happens when you’re wide awake.

For a benign example, you can look back to the PSAs of the 80’s and 90’s. “Give a Hoot, don’t pollute.” “Only YOU can prevent forest fires.” “Now I know. And knowing is half the battle…” (They NEVER told you the other half ;) )  Those repeated phrases drilled themselves into our psyches and became literal “words to live by.” To this day, I’ll carry garbage around with me for hours in order to find an appropriate receptacle because I give a hoot – dang it!

Growing up in the 80’s meant growing up in the shadow of pending nuclear holocaust due to the ongoing Cold War between the USA and the USSR. But even though Nuclear War and Divorce were neck and neck for the top two worries of children of my generation, there was always far more talk in the news about nuclear disarmament than nuclear Armageddon. For some IDIOTIC reason, that has now changed.

Biden AND the pundits are now talking about playing Toss the Nukes with Russia as casually as my dad used to mention divorce in my statistically average 80’s childhood home.  REALLY?!?  And for WHAT??? I’m serious – WHAT??? We haven’t even TRIED facilitating Peace Talks between Russia and Ukraine. In fact, the first thing our government did was shut down any and all communication with and access to foreign officials, reporters and news agencies that were reporting on things from the Russian perspective.

Does Russia disseminate propaganda – especially when on “war footing?” Darn tootin’. But – pssst – so do we. 

In my lifetime, most conflicts at least call cease-fires after a few weeks of destruction so a peace process can begin. Our current leadership? Nope. Money, money, money. Weapons, weapons, weapons. And NOW  - nuke, Nukes, NUKES.

You can’t talk about something constantly and expect it NOT to happen. So it’s SERIOUSLY time to change the dialogue. Because as bad as living through divorce can be – I got a feeling there’s wayyyyy more fallout from the other thing…