Transcript Intimate Justice:Finding Fairness in Love

The Two Realms of
Fairness
The Universal Realm…We’re Wired
for Justice (but also for revenge)
The Learned Realm
Recognizing Your Blind Spots and
False Assumptions
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8)
If I am loved enough, my partner will meet my needs
and be fair automatically.
Love conquers all.
What’s fair is intuitively obvious.
It isn’t fair for me to put my needs ahead of someone
I love.
Since I am a good person, my take on things is
usually fair.
The past is the past and has nothing to do with how
fair my relationship is now.
You can only have a fair relationship if the other
person changes.
Insight just excuses bad behavior.
Defining the New Fairness
A working definition: Four Key
Elements:
Reciprocity
Acknowledgment
Claims
Trust
The SeeSaw of Reciprocity
Balancing Give-and-Take
Errors in Give and Take
You can give too much.
You can take too much.
Relating from the Well of Trust
The Four Basic Violations
of Fairness
Loyalty Conflicts
“Stupid” Fights
Growing Pains
Enduring Injustice
Loyalty is a Payback
Loyalty: The Ties that
Bond and Bind
 And marriage makes three: loyalty systems
 Two tribes
 Marital Loyalty: Choosing Between
 Parents and Spouse
 New Spouse and Children
 You owe something to everyone…including yourself
“Stupid Fights”
 You left your dirty Kleenex on the bed when I’ve
asked you not to, over and over again.
 You left the gas tank on empty for me to fill up.
 You accepted a holiday invitation to your mother’s
without asking me.
 I can’t plan our weekends because your kids won’t
ever commit to a plan, and then you cave in.
 You left the dishes in the sink for me to clean up.
 Why’d you order that movie? You know I don’t like
Rambo.
Money, Children, Chores and Sex:
Resolving Fairness and the
Growing Pains of Love
 Inequitable, but fair? The Dance of Fairness
 The Chore Wars: Who Does More?
 Money: Who Makes It? Who Spends It? Who Decides?
 Money: Separate, Equal and Unhappy
 Jealously…Choose ME!
The Baggage You Bring to
Relationships
“Everybody’s got baggage…but my
husband was not a neat packer.” Ellie,
married sixteen years, divorced five.
“You keep bringing up the past, but in
the past I wore diapers too. What’s it
got to do with today?” (John, eight
years, second marriage)
Six Childhood Entitlements That Promote Fairness
1. Protection and preservation of the primary relationships
with your mother, father, siblings and extended family
2. Safe, reliable and nurturing parenting
3. Appropriate give-and-take between parent and child
4. Being valued
5. Negotiation of fairness issues
6. Repair and restoration of fairness and trust
Benefits of Repair
Increased ability to take personal responsibility
Increased empowerment and self-advocacy
Interrupt the perpetuation of the unfairness cycle
Use of voice over exit
The Relationship Survival Kit
Recognizing the Injustice Done
Acknowledging the Harmful
Consequences
Making a Claim to Restore Fairness
Replenishing Trust
Enduring Injustice: To the
Brink and Back to Fairness
Scenes from the minefields
The Paradox of Enduring Injustice
A New Model of Fairness Emerges
Your Fairness Toolbox
You can learn to be fair
Let go of a one-sided perspective
Practice what you’ve learned
Improve the relationship skills you
learned in childhood
Risk being vulnerable again
Repair is a two-way street
References
BIBLIOGRAPHY











Amato, P. How You Interact With Your Kids Today Can Affect Their Future Romantic Lives. Cited by Sue
Shellenbarger, WSJ Online, Work and Family, July 13, 2006.
Aron, A.,Fischer, H., Mashek, D.,Strong, G.,Li, Haifang, Brown, L.L. 迭eward, motivation, and emotion systems
associated with early-stage intense romantic love. Journal of Neurophysiology, 94: 327—337. First published May 31,
2005. See Carey, B.
Boszormenyi-Nagy, I. & Krasner, B. Between give & take. NY: Brunner/Mazel: 1986.
Boszormenyi-Nagy, I. & Krasner, B. Trust-based therapy: A contextual approach. American Journal of Psychiatry,
137, 767—775: 1980.
Boszormenyi-Nagy, I. & Spark, G. Invisible loyalties: Reciprocity in intergenerational family therapy. NY: Harper &
Row, 1973.
Cosomides, L. & Tooby, J. Knowing thyself: The evolutionary psychology of moral reasonsing and moral sentiments.
Business, Science, and Ethics, 91-127, 2002.
Cotroneo, M. (Winter 1987) Women and Abuse in the Context of the Family. In Journal of Psychotherapy and the
Family. Vol. 3.
Eaker,E, Sullivan,L, Kelly-Hayes,M. D’Agostino, R. Benjamin, E. Marital Status,Marital Strain, and Risk of
Coronary Heart Disease or Total Mortality: The Framingham Offspring Study. Psychosomatic Medicine, July18,
August, 69: 509-513, 2007.
Fruzzetti, A. E. The High Conflict Couple. A Dialectical Behavior Therapy Guide to Finding Peace, Intimacy, &
Validation. CA: New Harbinger Publications: 2006.
Gottman, J. Clinical manual for marital therapy. The Gottman Institute, 2005.
Graham, S. ScientificAmerican.com. Chimps sense of justice found similar to humans. January 26, 2005. From Sarah
Brosnan & Fran deWaal, Feb.7, 2005, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.