Six Characteristics to Avoid In Relationships, If You Want A Healthy One ...................9/9/14

One definition of discernment

      In this post, written last Thursday, I shared reasons why it is hard find Safe People, those who help us thrive and become better people. They were:
1.  Lacking Discernment.
2.  Not Knowing How to Connect.
3.  Fear of Abandonment. This is settling for less than is desirable.

     You can read the previous post in the link above, for more details on these three.  I will continue from there. The fourth reason is:

4.  Defensive Hope.  I cover this subject in depth here.  Take a look at this link,  you will be glad you did.  Part of it is that we are trying to protect ourselves against grief and sadness.

Defensive Hope is a deliberate avoidance of the
reality that is right in front of us, regarding someone who harms our tranquility and usually our dignity.
5.  Unwillingness to Take an Honest, Searching Moral Inventory of Ourselves.  This is presenting ourselves as nicer than we are.  This is denial. Many who do this have unhealthy relationships for help in keeping the illusion that the difficulties in their lives is due to others and not themselves. These unsafe relationships provide a distraction from what is going on within them.

6.  Fear of Confrontation.
    We get what we tolerate. We try to live up to the approval standards of others. This is disastrous. This is remaining a child. One mark of an adult is that we can disagree.

     Here is the twist: people who do not confront are the kind of people that hurtful people glomb unto.  People with good boundaries, who confront clearly, yet kindly, do not have the negative characteristics of Unsafe People who are also known as Emotional Vampires. They are able to use what I call Emotional Aikido to take care of their emotional selves and their dignity.

      If a person doesn't confront, they are literally set up for a pattern of unsafe relationships, and they will rarely find a safe relationship.

  As Henry Cloud and John Townsend say in their book Safe People:

The inability to confront is license for unsafety.  Being unable to confront someone is like having a farm with no fences, or a body without skin. No matter how careful one is, he would always be getting poisoned or infected because of the lack of protection. Someone who is afraid to confront hurtful or abusive patterns in a relationship will find plenty of unsafe people available to take advantage of him.                            p 100

How About You?
What are other ways we can attract unsafe people?