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Welcome to episode 153 of The Non-Anxious Leader Podcast. I'm Jack Shitama, and we are going to get right into today's episode. The Christmas holidays are a wonderful time of the year as the song goes, but they are not so wonderful for many people because of estrangement. Today's episode was sparked by an article I read in the Washington Post Managing Family Estrangements during the Holidays by Christina Weyman. Weyman cites research that over a quarter of Americans have at least one estranged family member. This would be about 67 million Americans if extrapolated from the US adult population.

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And this was pre pandemic. So this is before there was a divisive election of 2020 and before the pandemic started separating people into political divisions based on how they viewed the virus and the response. Estrangement itself and family systems terms is emotional cut off. If you think of a continuum with self definition or individuality at one end and emotional connection and togetherness at the other end, then estrangement is an extreme form of individuality or self definition. The person who has decided to cut themselves off has decided that they will have no emotional connection with certain others, or sometimes all of the people in a system at the other end of the spectrum is emotional connection or togetherness.

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And this is where people are not able to make decisions on their own. So when two people are fused, they in some way are not able to act independently to self differentiated, to self define. And often this means that one person is calling the shots and the other person is adapting. Sometimes fusion can come in a group where surrounding together this pressure is so intense that nobody can make a decision on their own, and whenever they do decide something, they all have to do it together. But the whole subject of fusion, that other end of the continuum from estrangement or cut off.

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The subject of fusion really is a subject for another episode. As I noted, the problem with estrangement or cut off is that there is no emotional connection. The person who has decided to pull away has determined they will have nothing to do with one person or others in the system. This is not a sign of strength. This is a sign that they are unable to differentiate. They are unable to be themselves while remaining connected to others and allowing others to be themselves. One way that people try to manage this kind of cut off when they have been cut off by an estranged loved one is to just ignore it, to try to move on and live life without this missing person.

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But this is difficult in families and difficult around the holidays, especially one of the reasons for this is grief. According to the article, one of the reasons that cut off is difficult is that it creates a form of grief called ambiguous loss, unlike the death of a loved one or another kind of total loss, like the loss of a job. We haven't even known that we are grieving this kind of loss. An ambiguous loss is something that knows at us when sometimes we are not even able to acknowledge that there is a loss that we are grieving.

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It's ambiguous because we can't really point to the fact that it is a loss because the other person is still living and breathing. This also makes it hard for other people to understand because they don't get why the grieving person doesn't just move on and leave the estranged one behind. That's easy to do in theory, but very difficult to do if you really care about the person who is estranged. One thing that the article recommends is what is called intentionality. According to Ramani Durvasula, a clinical psychologist and author of three books, "I tell clients to do a guided meditation, close your eyes and imagine what the previous holidays have been like with the people you're grieving. By remembering the discomfort you endured during holidays before the estrangement, you may be able to reframe your current feelings of loneliness." This kind of intentionality is different than what I talk about when I speak about being deliberate and acting in differentiated ways. This is more about an inward reflection to remind us that even though we miss a loved one who is estranged, that we shouldn't forget the reasons that are behind it. Assuming that we are not the ones doing the cutting off, we can reflect on this and be reminded of the negative and even toxic behaviors that have led to the estrangement and those behaviors that particularly occur around holidays that make holidays not so much fun.

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This helps us to not romanticize the holidays around the family member. It's not ideal, but it's reality. A similar suggestion is to make a list of toxic behaviors and aggressions that were present in holidays past from the estranged family member. This can bring us back to reality, even if it's painful. But after doing that, make a list of things that can lift your spirits. The idea here is to try to bring yourself into the present so that you can make the best of the Christmas holiday or any holiday even as you mourn the loss of a cut off family member.

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Another suggestion is to Journal so that you can be honest with yourself about your feelings and your sense of loss. One of the most self differentiated things we can do is to own our pain, to lean into it, to embrace it. Not because we like it, but because by not avoiding it, we are better able to live in the present. The article notes that if you are in therapy, extra sessions will help during the holidays. Again, this is leaning into the pain to embrace it, not to wallow in.

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It not to feel sorry for yourself, but to help yourself actually deal come to terms with what is going on and further take responsibility for self. Another suggestion is to create a ritual that helps symbolize the grief this ambiguous loss. Two of the suggestions are lighting a candle and letting go of the situation, letting go of the family member for the time being. Another is to write an angry letter to the family member to share your feelings, to spill your guts about what you're feeling and then burn the letter.

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Remember that oftentimes the most important thing that we can do is to take responsibility for self. It doesn't mean that we need to always engage with the other person if we can own our feelings. If we can get them out, we are more clear on who we are and what we are about. One last thing that the article suggests is positive, and that is to cultivate relationships with healthy people who respect boundaries and belief systems instead of focusing on loss. What this is doing is trying to build a system of people around you that are also able to be themselves and who are able to self differentiate.

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This will do more to help you to self differentiate than anything. Finally, the article doesn't say this, but I would suggest praying for the estranged one, not for them to come to their senses or to admit all their wrongs, but just praying for God's Grace to be in their lives. And I believe that what this does is this has an effect on us. It helps us to let go of the situation and realize that we can only take responsibility for ourself and not for somebody else.

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This also helps us to leave the door open for further conversation. According to Bill Selby, founder of the center for Pastoral Effectiveness in the Rockies, there is no such thing as a period in Family Systems Theory. All sentences always end with a comma. In this way, we can leave the door open for further conversation. The definition of self-differentiation in a cut off relationship is to be willing to be open to the cut off person to the person who is a strange be open if they want to move closer.

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As I noted in episode 135 on Emotional Cut Off, there are ways to keep the door open, even if we are not the ones who can decide to walk through it. Showing Grace to others is that comma? It leaves open the possibility for conversation and for connection, even if you don't believe the other deserves it, even if they don't ask for forgiveness. But that's the definition of Grace. It's offering unconditional love and mercy to another, even if they don't deserve it. And that doesn't mean you have to forgive the other that's a whole different level of internalized healing.

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And I believe only God can do that but you can offer Grace and you can pray for your estranged loved one and ask that God would give them Grace as well. Non-anxious Leaders leave open the possibility for connection for healing, for reconciliation because that's actually what is best for us. It enables us to take responsibility for ourselves and leave the responsibility for others to themselves. If we can do that, whether it's in the holidays or any other time, we are better able to be a nonanxious presence.

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That's it for episode 153. You can connect with me at thenonanxiousleader.com. You can also find the show notes at thenonanxiousleader.com/153 until next time. Thanks and goodbye.

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