I was just wanting to see what people think is our responsibility when having disclosed about our sexuality and as a result our family, homes and friends go off the deep end. Is it possible to feel over responsible and take everyones pain onboard or attitude onboard and try and fix it? How do you not do that?

Is it possible to be under the impression that its all your own fault that you said anything at all? how do you get through getting over that?

I was under the impression that it’s good to take responsibility for things and that accepting responsibility for those things that you can change, was the first step to making things all better.

Is this a one way street or do other peoples wills/emotions and such come into it? What part is ours and what part of this isnt?

Hey Mags

Damn good question & tricky too boot 🙂

For me the simple answer is that we are responsible for our own actions, reactions, emotions and experiences. We are NOT responsible for other peoples behaviour or emotions. hehehe, dont you love clinical separation from real humans :p

In reality, especially for Christains i think we are called to be kind and loving, this includes being considerate for others.

I recently had a chat with friends about their experience of a parent that wasnt accepting of their sexuality, especially their partner. What she decided to do was say to her mum that she loved her and really wanted to be with her for Christmas, but if her partner wasnt welcome she would not come this year. She did it in a non threatening way & was not blackmailing, but rather stating very clearly her boundary to her mother. This is who i am & this is my partner who is my family now. I love you & want to be with you, but if you are not willing or able to accept me yet, that is ok, but i wont be here at Christmas. For me that is a clear example of integrity and compassion.

For some people they are in a different place & are not able to be that straight up with family & i dont judge that, as we are all on our own unique journeys with our own unique battles to fight 🙂

Ummmm, did i answer that qustion, hehehehehe 🙂

Penny

Hmmmm, man thats tricky!!!

For me, i use kindness as a guide. I find niceness sickly, but kindness seems to work as a guide for me in how i interact with the rest of this creation.

I think speaking truth in love is important, especially if it sharing who we are with people who are significant in our lives.

If people are unable or unwilling to accept that, you can attempt to negotiate or try & move through it, but how they respond is not your responsibility. Someone elses emotions are NEVER your responsibility.

If you are being a selfish mean brat & acting out in pig headed insensitivity, thats a whole other matter. But, even still, you are then only responsible for your actions and words, not how people respond to that.

The guilt or sense of feeling responsible for someone elses experience of you is hard. When you figure that one out, can you let me know. Especially when its people we love, cause we just want them to enjoy who we are…

Life is freaking messy & VERY imperfect! Why else would we need Christ in our lives??? We just keep praying, reflecting, learning, suceeding, screwing up, asking for forgiveness, negotiating, laughing, crying, loving & muddling along in this gloriously delicious journey of being human 🙂

I was just wanting to see what people think is our responsibility when having disclosed about our sexuality and as a result our family, homes and friends go off the deep end.

I think it depends on the circumstances and why the individual has ‘gone off the deep end’ to begin with. The circumstances matter. For instance I kind of went off the deep end when my dad came out because not only was it shocking but it also forced me to look at myself, my decisions and attitudes and make some hard decisions because suddenly homosexuality wasn’t just my issue any more. When an individual goes off the deep end for selfish reasons such as these then no it isn’t anyones responsibility but theirs because its often not really about the person comming out at all.

But say for example you end a marriage because you come out. You are then responsible for the pain and suffering of that other person. You make a forever commitment and break it. You are responsible for the consequences of your actions. I’m not suggesting that you are at fault for comming out or minimising the impact that society and norms can have when it comes to poor decision making but you are responsible not only for yourself but for the reaction of the other person because fair or not, intended or not your decisions have consequences.

This is not to say that a person ought to be bogged down with shame and guilt for comming out. Achknowledging the hurt and suffering you cause people intentionally or not and within a reasonable framework trying to ease that pain is taking responsibility. It doesn’t mean that what you have done was the wrong thing to do or that you ought to feel guilty for it.

I remember reading something Malcom Boyde once wrote (and as a general rule I kind of like the guy) but he writes of his first experience with a man which happened with his wife in the next room. He describes it as an education, a veil lifted from his eyes and so on and so forth. He paints it as this wonderful thing that he is so glad has happened. Now as a gay man I am sure all that is true but where is the responsiblity there? Where is the achknowledgement that he just committed adultery and adultery is a bad thing whether you are gay or not?! It doen’t mean he should carry around the shame for the rest of his life but we all need to achknowledge that our actions have consequences for other people.

I didn’t actually feel I had a choice……except to continue to live a lie. As difficult as it was for all of us I think the honest choice was the honourable one.

If anything in my last post indicated that I disagree with that statement then I owe you an appology. To accept responsibility is not to assume fault OR to assume the inherrent rightness or wrongness of a decision. We take responsibility for the decisions we make right was well as the wrong ones so as far as I am concerned this isn’t about the honour in your intentions.

So my responsibility was to be honest. The way others respond to that is not my responsibility.

This is where we disagree I think… but I wonder whether we disagree at all really or just take different approaches to the meaning of being responsible. There have been times in my life where I have had to be responsibile for the part that I have played in situations gone bad and when trying to determine whether I am or not I ask myself one question… “am I to any degree the author, cause or occassion of this situation comming about?” This is why one isn’t responsible for the reactions of people walking down the street, they played no part.

But in the situation of a divorce then yes you do have a responsibility because to one degree or another you are the author, cause or occassion for it comming about and it is only plausible for you to take responsibility within a reasonable framework.

In the circumstance of your daughter I would theorise that it is fair for you to take responsibility for the pain she felt as a child when you were first divorced from your wife. However studies on children from divorced families indicate that this initial shock and hurt is temporary and usually only lasts a few weeks… months at the most as children adjust to a new situation. Whatever else has gone on which has enabled her to carry this pain into her adult life is not tied to the divorce per se and is then not tied to your responsibility for that divorce. The proof of this if you will is your other daughter with whom you maintain a normal relationship but who went though the exact same circumstances.

Humans are complex creatures and we interact with each other in complex ways so usually in most situations there is more than one author, cause or occassion for something comming about.