Landon (00:00.81)
You can fail in a relationship without failing as a person.
Announcer
Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of Heartbeat, the podcast, featuring the insight and teaching of Landon Saunders. On today's episode, we return to the community workshop where in our last episode, Landon introduced the idea of certain undeniable about relationship. And today,
He picks up with undeniable number two. Here's Landon.
Landon
You can fail in a relationship without failing as a person. There may be individuals here who have been through a divorce. That just bottoms out esteem, leaves you feeling like a failure. You go back over the years and remember everything you've ever done. And it's so easy.
not to feel like that you have failed as a human being.
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But just as any relationship can change because of you, it is just as true that you can fail in a relationship without failing as a human being.
Now, how can that be true? You see, when I'm in this relationship that is not going well, and I feel like I failed, and it may be a friendship, it may be a marriage, it may be with a child, any number of reasons might account for it. But how do I keep from feeling that I myself have just failed in this process? Well.
I'm going to leave you just with the undeniable, because you must work through this one. That somehow, I don't know how to give you a formula for that, except to appeal to the wisdom that's in you and the common sense that's in you. That if you have failed in a relationship, look in the mirror, and that does not mean that you have failed as a person. Part of the reason is...
that you're never simply what has failed, are you? You're never simply that. A gentleman asked last night, how do you feel good about yourself if you're sort of presiding over a dying business? Well, you see, you're really not the dying business, are you? There is a person there that built a business in a relationship that is dying or has died. There's a person there that went into that relationship.
and that person's still there. There's a person that did some good things in that relationship, and that person is still there. There's a person that made great contributions to that relationship, and that person is still there. Failure in a relationship doesn't mean that you have failed as a human being. It's just painful, and you work through that. But you must always keep reminding yourself that you're still a man, that you're still a woman.
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and that your life isn't over and that your life hasn't been given an F. You still get an A in life even if we have some failures here and there, even if that failure is something as difficult as a broken relationship. Now I want to say that one softly and gently because that is as tricky and as touchy as anything we could talk about tonight.
The third thing that is undeniably true about relationships is that one helpful relationship can help you carry a relationship that is more difficult. One helpful relationship can make you carry one that is more difficult. Jackie Robinson was the first black in baseball. He had played all across this country, and when he would come on the field, the slurs, the boos.
the beer cans, the rocks, the hoots, the howls, and he'd experienced that all across the country, and then he came home to Brooklyn. And how wonderful it was to be home in Brooklyn and to go out on the field and for the stadium to be quiet. No jeers and no slurs. Until, of course, he made a mistake.
When he made a mistake, the stands went wild. He missed a ball. And the hoots and the jeers and the screams started. They started pelting the field. And soon Pee-wee Reese, the shortstop, walked across the diamond and stood beside Jackie Robinson and then reached up and put his arm around his shoulder.and the stadium became as quiet as a cemetery. And Jackie Robinson later said that Pee Wee Reese in that moment saved his career.
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one helpful relationship. Now for me, one of my really first helpful relationships came when I was still in grade school and going into junior high, because I was a late grower, which means I was a runt. I was so short and so tiny and so little that, and we would choose upsides, a recess for ball, softball or whatever we were going to play, and always the toughest ones in class got to be the captains, and so I was never the captain. And when the captains would begin choosing, well, they would begin choosing the best and the biggest first. Now, the runt stands and he watches this and he experiences it. All these names called, you know, everybody divided up, and then finally, last, I would hear someone say, last.
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But there was one kid in my class who was the toughest kid in class, the strongest and the best athlete, and his name was Ross Burks. And Ross Burks liked me. And when he was captain, as he often was, guess who he would choose first? He would say, Landon. I want Landon on my team.
And I would walk over there just so proud and stand beside him and people would snicker until Mr. Burks put those evil glares on him and they would quiet down. Now, how do you think that made me feel? Oh my, it made me work harder at bat. It made me do better in the field. May have changed my life, I don't know.
Announcer
Landon will be right back, but we want to invite you to visit ThisIsHeartbeat.com, where you can sign up to receive the joyful Jumpstart email in your inbox every few days.
Now back to Landon.
Landon
Now if we're in bad relationships, we need some assistance. You need someone with whom you can talk, someone that knows what you're in, someone who can encourage you. I heard recently of a little boy in the fourth grade who was a member of an all-boys school and he got cancer. And he'd been through all the chemotherapy and he'd lost all of his hair. And they had made a move in the process.
And he was going into this new class, a new boy's school. And the father, knowing how traumatic it was, the little boy had been so upset he just knew that they were going to make fun of him when he went in with his bald head and that he would be teased and shamed. And so the father decided to go to the school a few days earlier and talk to the teacher and tell him about the fears that the little boy had. The teacher went. and talked to the class about it. And so it comes to the first day when the little boy with cancer is going to class. And when he walks into the classroom, there are 14 little boys with shaved heads.
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One helpful relationship. That's all it takes, isn't it? He had about 14.
The business of life and the business of getting along with each other, the business of being in relationships, friendships and at work and in business, and then intimate relationships and between parents and children, they're not easy, but they can work if we can take a more common sense approach to it and remember what's really true. One helpful relationship can help you carry the more difficult relationships.
Now, it's also true that no relationship is ever equal. We can put that down as a thing that is absolutely, undeniably true, that no relationship is ever equal. Now.
Somebody says, well, you know, my wife, she's the one, she's better educated and she's making more money and it just makes me feel bad. Or it can be vice versa. You know, where one person is either as more skilled or they're more outgoing and you always feel like that you never quite carry your weight, that you're never quite moving right in that relationship. Now, the truth is, there never was a relationship that's equal.
That's not what's important. Do you know what is important?
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What is important is that you bring your true, genuine self to that relationship.
When you meet, I'll tell you, when you meet a real, genuine human being, do you think you're going to mistreat that person? Do you think you're going to try to get rid of that person? No, they're too much a rarity.
And so what we specialize on again is not just trying to catch up. Now you may wanna do some things to improve here and to improve there and to make some things better that you want to do, but it's not the end of the world. That what's really critical is that you bring your own genuine self to that relationship. You can be in a bad relationship and still feel good about yourself. That's the other one.
You can feel, you can be in a bad relationship and still feel good about yourself. Now let's work with that one a moment because this one may be the most critical. You can be in a bad relationship and still feel good about yourself. How are you going to do that? Well, let's look at this one. First of all, you may need to tell the other individual that from now on, you're not going to feel bad about yourself anymore.
Just tell them that. This is a little conversation that you're going to have. You're going to say to them, now I'm going to have a little conversation with you, and in this little conversation with you, I have to tell you something that I've never told you before, and that's this. I have allowed you, not because you did it, because I allowed it, I have allowed you to make me feel bad about myself for days, weeks, perhaps even years.
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And what I've decided is that that's not right, that doesn't help you, doesn't help anyone else I know, and it certainly doesn't help me. And so from now on, I am taking that privilege back. Now, they'll be very distressed because they may have enjoyed, you know, to the nines making you feel bad.
It's become a sort of way of life with them. And so they're gonna feel a little threatened and be gentle with them. Don't hurt them when you tell them this. But just tell them, now, we've had, this is the way this relationship has been going on, but now this relationship isn't going to go on that way anymore.
Because from now on, I'm gonna keep smiling and I'm gonna feel good about myself. I wanna be with you. I wanna be in this relationship and I'm gonna do the best I can in this relationship. But the thing that's going to change is that I'm not going to let you make me feel bad anymore.
And remember that all those things that have happened to you, they're all parts of your life.
but there's something that lies deeper than all of those things, that's you. And you hold on to that core, and you hold on to that center. The last undeniable is that you can overcome any hurt. You can, it'll take time, but you can overcome any hurt, no matter what that hurt is.
Announcer
We are so pleased you are with us today. And if you enjoyed the podcast, then we invite you to share your appreciation with others by rating and reviewing the podcast. And of course, we invite you to join us on the next episode where we'll drop in one more time on the community workshop. Until then, for all the friends of Heartbeat who make this podcast possible, here's to feeling good about yourself.
