Being in a marriage is like one long teeter-totter ride, where it takes finesse and decorum to keep it going gently up and down and up and down, a balanced movement.
Do you remember how you can gain control in two ways on the teeter-totter? By moving your weight you can keep a person up in the air, unable to get down or by getting off he will be slammed into the ground.
It seems that one person can take over control of the teeter-totter and in doing so gains control over the person on the other end and has the power to restore the momentum or stop it.
We have many teeter-totter games going with all of our relationships, and we can feel or know when the momentum changes, when they have more power over us than we ourselves, and in that moment we have choices to make.
In my past co-dependent teeter-totter rides, I was always on the end with no power, either waiting to be slammed into the ground or up in the air unable to move, and the person in charge, wasn’t concerned about me, but rather did what they needed to do, while I was along for the bumpy ride. Somehow it never occurred to me to get off to and not go back.
We truly are in charge of how we feel in relationships, how their actions affect us on the other end, will it plummet us to the ground and hurt us, or will it leave us powerless.
Learning how to teeter-totter in a relationship is key to having a beautiful friendship, to even know you have the power to slam them down, but don’t.
As we teeter up and down, as we ride along with a gentle rhythm, every now and then something lands upon our teeter-totter that throws us off balance.
A new experience has been added to our routine, and how do we balance ourselves back out?
What I do know for certain is that a marriage or a friendship isn’t a flat line, a secure steady beam, but an up and down living breathing growing life like organism.
They are all mysteries whose ending we don’t know.
We can’t know what will happen to make the other leave, or what will make them use their power to manipulate and control or abuse, or what will make them just sit when it is their turn to push off.
I am all I can be sure of.
I know when I will stay on and when I get off.
I have learned what it feels like to be in the air with out power and slammed down in hurt, and I also know what to do to stop those feelings. I get off.
What is the old line, “Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me”!
It isn’t so much about knowing who to teeter with but knowing when to get off.
What is very interesting to me is that they banned the teeter-totters from school play grounds, they were too dangerous, and in fact they were great tools in getting to know someone, you could tell how kind they were by how they teetered.
I M Perfect lady 