The Importance of Laughter and Tears

Ron grew up in a household where laughter and tears were never expressed. Anger was the main feeling expressed by his mother, while his father was mostly withdrawn. By the time Ron was eight years old, he had managed to shut off both his laughter and his tears to avoid feeling rejected by his parents and controlled by his mother. Shutting down was his way of protecting against being invaded by his very controlling mother. He became a serious child - a controlled and controlling child.

Ron grew up, went to college, became a successful lawyer, married and had three children. Yet nothing, not even his deep love for his children, managed to break through his rigid, controlling way of being.

Ron reached out for my help because he was not only very unhappy, but was often in physical pain. All he could say about the physical pain was that he hurt. "My body hurts. My chest hurt, my stomach hurts, and my back hurts." He had been thoroughly checked out by a physician and learned that nothing was physically wrong. The doctor told him it was stress.

Ron told me that he spent much of his non-working time daydreaming because when he was present with himself in the moment, all he felt was pain. He had learned to daydream to avoid the pain.

However, Ron was now 48 years old, and the daydreaming was no longer working well. The pain was breaking through, especially in the form of debilitating back pain, so Ron decided he needed some help.

The issue behind Ron's pain was that his primary intention in his life was to control. He wanted to control how others felt about him. He wanted to control how well his employees worked. He wanted to control how his wife treated him, as well as how well his children did in school. He particularly wanted to have control over not feeling the pain of rejection and the fear of engulfnment that he had felt so much in his family.

Ron's control had worked for him to a certain extent. He was financially successful. He had all the material things a person could want