Remember when you were a kid and used to play pretend? I do. In third grade I made up a game at recess which involved me becoming "the monster" while a group of us were innocently playing in our make-believe woods on the playground's blacktop. Once my "monster" self appeared, I would run and try to capture those around me. I got so wrapped up in becoming my pretend "monster" that coming back into class one day after recess, someone anonymously wrote "Monster Mary" on my crayon box. I wasn't offended so much as flattered. Being a "monster" every day at recess was one trance I liked living whenever I got the chance...
As we grow up, however, the trances we live aren't so clear-cut as choosing to become a monster during afternoon recess. Instead, we very often don't even know what we are doing until we want "out" and are done playing the trance we are living once and for all. I have seen this far too often in psychotherapy; a couple are in the midst of a separation and/or divorce...and it comes out somewhere along the way that one or the other spouse felt "forced" to be someone he or she was not in the context of the marriage. "I never wanted to work; he MADE me work because we'd be out on the street otherwise..." "She never had enough; it was like I had to smell good, look good, play nice, never contradict her in public..." "He was SO mean to me behind closed doors but as soon as someone showed up, he became Mr. Wonderful.." This is is the stuff of the trances we live.
Probably the most difficult (and yet so obvious!) trance to recognize is the one where one or the other spouse got married to obtain a parent rather than a partner for life. I have seen this trance lived out in all kinds of ways. The wife who cannot seem to emotionally manage even the most insignificant stressor ("The baby IS CRYING...go shut him up NOW!")or the husband who never seems to find "the right job" because (fill in the blank there yourself folks!)... Here's a clue; if your spouse behaves like "party time" (or any other form of "free time") is the thing he or she is truly living for and/or focused on day in and day out---chances are pretty great you have a kid trapped in an adult's body as a spouse. Period.
In reality, it's the the trances we live that become front and center in these dysfunctional marital relationships more so than anything else. Getting married does NOT mean getting the "Get out of Responsibility Free" card for life. Yet these are the same people that when they become tired of "putting up with his/her b.s. 24/7" (aka functioning themselves as a responsible adult)...they want out.
Funny how that works. So a person chooses to get married to find a good mommy or daddy substitute rather than an equal partner---then does whatever to either "play" responsible adult for a while (or not at all if they are stuck in the teenage rebel mode)---and then when they've had enough of their self-induced trance state because it isn't working to get them what they "really" want, they blame their partner for it! Yeah o.k. That'll work. NOT!
The trances we live can really do a number not only on our own inability to heal, change, and grow in a positive way...but on the unfortunate victims in all this mayhem---our children. So think about snapping out of your trance and facing the truth about who you are and why you do (or don't do!) what you do when you do it. Trances aren't meant to be coping mechanisms. Trances belong with games of pretend which is exactly what they are...games of pretend.
Happy weekend!
