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Welcome to Episode 103 of The Non-Anxious Leader podcast. I'm Jack Shitama, and before we get into today's episode, another reminder that we are starting a 12 week book study of my book, If You Met My Family, You'd Understand: A Family Systems Primer. It starts on Tuesday, January 12th at 7:00 pm EST. If you are interested in learning more about family systems theory, then this is the place to do it. You can find out all the information and sign up at The Non-Anxious Leader Network. I will put a link in the show notes or you can go to network.nonanxiousleader.com. Now, without further ado, here is 103 on the magnet theory of emotional distance.

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Last week's episode focused on emotional intensity and the problems that can be caused when there is too much of it. What I didn't mention was that too much emotional intensity destroys emotional space. If you haven't listened to Episode 102, it will be helpful for you to do that before moving into this episode. I will put a link in the show notes.

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Emotional distance is a tricky thing, if there's too little emotional distance, then problems can occur. Likewise, if there's too much emotional distance, you can also have problems in a relationship and subsequently in the system within which you are functioning.

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Emotional distance, or emotional space, is a function of two components. The first is emotional connection. Healthy emotional connection creates healthy emotional space. When there is too much emotional connection, this makes self-differentiation difficult. This typically results when one person is pushing for togetherness with another in the system or others in the system. This creates surrounding togetherness pressure, which makes differentiation more difficult and can destroy emotional distance.

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This is when the emotional intensity from a person trying to define others, trying to connect with others and get them to comply with what they want, destroys emotional distance. This raises the anxiety in the system for everyone.

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The second component of healthy emotional distance is self-definition. In fact, one way to understand self-differentiation is self-definition with appropriate emotional connection. So when you have both, you have self-differentiation. But without self-definition, it is difficult to create healthy emotional space.

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When you are unable to self-define in a healthy way, it means you're going to react in an anxious way or you're going to adapt. You're going to give in and just comply to the surrounding togetherness pressure. When there is too much emotional space, too much emotional distance and too little emotional connection, this can also cause problems in a relationship and the system. This is when one or both of the people in the relationship are unable to self-differentiate, so they pull away to avoid having to deal with each other. In the extreme, this results in emotional cut off.

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When there is too little emotional connection, that is too much emotional space or emotional distance, this also increases anxiety in the system in the way that too much emotional connection or too little emotional distance can.

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To help understand this, I have developed what I call the magnet theory of emotional distance. This so-called magnet theory of emotional space, emotional distance, is not so much a theory as it is a metaphor to help understand what healthy emotional space looks like. Think of any two people who are in a relationship as being magnets. The idea here is that you want to have healthy emotional space, you don't want to be too close and you don't want to be too far away.

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First, think about what happens when two magnets get very close together. Depending on how their poles are aligned two different things can happen. If the polls are opposite, that is one is positive and one is negative, what happens is that when they get very close, the attraction snaps them together, pulls them together so that it's difficult to pull them apart. Think of this as emotional fusion when two people are so close together that one is hardly able to differentiate from the other.

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The most common scenario here is when one person is pursuing a relationship, pushing for togetherness and the other is unable to self-differentiate and resorts to adaptive behavior. In this case, the pursuer is the one who defines the relationship and the adaptive one gives in to the wishes of the pursuer, losing the ability to self differentiate.

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The second thing that can happen when two magnets get close together is that when their poles are the same, either they're both positive or they're both negative, then when two magnets get close to each other, they push each other apart. They repel.

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The second type of reaction when magnets get close to each other is analogous to reactivity. Typically in a relationship, if one person is pursuing or pushing for togetherness with the other, and the other is unable to self-differentiate, they will either be adaptive or reactive. Now, we've already talked about the adaptive case when they get stuck together. In this case, this would be analogous to a reactive response. Rather than adapting, the one who is unable to self-differentiated resorts to arguing or fighting, causing her or his own anxiety to increase, which also increases anxiety in the system.

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I had a listener emaile me about a week before Thanksgiving asking for advice. His mother was coming to visit and they had a relationship that would be described as reactive. For example, she would ask him a question about why he did something, a certain way. He would explain, then she would try to convince him of why her way was better. Or he would share a challenge that he was going through and she would offer advice that he did not find helpful.

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His natural reaction was to get frustrated with her, even to the point of losing his temper. That is reactivity. What I recognized from family systems theory was that his mom's behavior was actually a push for togetherness. It was a desire to move closer. In this case, she was pursuing him and the only way she knew how was by trying to help him.

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But he was experiencing this as her trying to define him, which increased his frustration and his anxiety. This is like two magnets, both with the same pole, and as one gets closer, it actually pushes the other away. Recognizing this phenomenon, that his mom was actually trying to get closer to him, even if it made him frustrated, in theory, makes it easier to have compassion for her and to self-regulate.

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The other end of the spectrum, when we are talking about two magnets and using this metaphor, is that when they are too far apart, there is no attraction, there's no pull at all. It doesn't matter how the poles are aligned, there will not be any attraction. This is essentially when there may be self-definition, but there's no emotional connection. And without emotional connection, anxiety in the system will increase.

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So understanding what happens when magnets get too close together or too far apart helps us then to understand what healthy emotional space looks like. Healthy emotional space occurs when people are close, but not too close. It's characterized by self-differentiation, by both emotional connection and self-definition.

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Now, I'm going to stretch the metaphor a bit here. Think of self-differentiation in this case as being the poles of the magnet's being opposite. So they are able to be different. They're able to be opposite from each other, but still have healthy emotional connection. In this case, when the magnets are close together, but not too close, there is a continual magnetic pull between them.

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Think of this as an attraction, as healthy connection that you want to be close. You're drawn to be close together, but you're not pulled to be fused to one another emotionally. This helps me to think of what healthy emotional space looks like. You're not bonded together, you're not fused, you're not so far apart that you're not connected at all. You are close enough that there is an attraction. There is a pull that you want to be together, but you are still able to be yourselves.

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This is what non-anxious leaders do. This is what it means to be a non-anxious presence. When you are a non-anxious presence, people want to be around you. The reason they want to be around you is that you give them the freedom to be themselves even as you are being yourself. People are attracted to this kind of non-anxious presence. It creates healthy emotional space and it helps the entire system function in healthier ways.

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In summary, I like to think of emotional connection, emotional distance in this way: when there is reactivity or adaptivity, then there is too little emotional distance, there is not enough emotional space. Reactivity would be when there is arguing or conflict, and adaptivity would be when there is giving in, a lack of self definition. In either case, there is too little emotional space.

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The best way to deal with this is to try to create healthy emotional space by staying connected, but by not reacting or adapting. In the case of the listener who emailed me before Thanksgiving, I suggested that he ask his mother about what things were like for her growing up at Thanksgiving.

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Now, remember, process and not content. The process here is connecting in a healthy way. The content happened to be asking her about Thanksgiving, but you can ask questions about anything that allows people to share about things that were formative to them or important to them. This will not only create healthy emotional bonds, but it will give you insight into what makes the other tick.

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What this type of conversation does is it helps you to self regulate because you are not having to define yourself, you're not having to defend yourself, you're not having to argue your point. You're just listening to the other person. We've talked about that in previous podcasts about how you do that in anxious situations. But in this case, the point is to try to move closer in a healthy way.

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So instead of doing the same old dance where they say something and you react in a certain way or they say something and you adapt in a certain way, you're coming at it from a different angle. You're trying to move closer, but do it in a healthy way by asking questions, by wanting to get to know them better on a topic that is less anxious between the two of you.

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The other side of the coin is when there is too much emotional distance, even to the point of cut off. Often this excess emotional distance is created by trying to avoid conflict or avoid giving in. And while this may work in terms of making you feel better because you're avoiding things, it will actually create more anxiety in the system and make it harder for you to function in healthy ways in the system, depending on the severity of the cut off.

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This can be really difficult, but in a similar way it is about connecting. Oftentimes listening is helpful. You're having a conversation where you're mostly just hearing what the other has to say, even if it starts out as a rant, even if it starts out with a lot of anxiety. If you can maintain a non-anxious presence, be a listener, and just hear what they have to say, then you can come back with calm responses that perhaps differentiate yourself. But more often you can just reflect back what you're hearing from them, what emotions they are communicating to you, then you have the chance to begin closing that distance, to start to increase the emotional connection and get it to a healthy place.

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As with anything in family systems, the more chronic, the more challenging, the more anxious relationships have been over time, the more difficult it is to do this. It takes persistence. It might require the use of a therapist or a coach to help you work through it. But we do know that this is the way to find healthy emotional space. In certain cases, it happens right away. In other cases, it can take quite a long time.

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But in either case it is worth the work. And for non-anxious leaders when we are able to do this work, when we were able to figure out how to find healthy emotional distance with others, we end up with lower anxiety in the system and a greater desire for people to connect and to work together. That is what we want, whether it's a family, a congregation or an organization.