Why Looking Backward is the First Step to Moving Forward in Relationships

The Battle You Are Actually Fighting

What if some of the struggles you're having in your relationships today aren't really about the people in front of you? What if some of them started long before you ever met them? It's very possible.

What if the way you shut down, the way you struggle to speak up, the way you react to criticism, or the way you feel like you have to keep somebody else happy started long before you ever realize what was happening in your relationships? But for those of you who are married, you may see this show up in your marriage.

For those of you who are single, you may see it in dating, friendships, family, work, church, or even the way you relate to yourself. Sometimes we think we're fighting with our spouse, a roommate, a romantic partner or coworker when we're actually fighting an old battle.

When the Presenting Problem Isn’t the Root Problem

In the last episode, I challenged you to take one courage step backward, one courageous step backward and examine your family of origin. Today I’m going to show you why that step matters through a story of a client who discovered that some of what was happening in her marriage wasn't really about her marriage at all.

She had to look backward before she could finally move forward. Welcome back to the biblical film room, a place where we slow down, reflect, and let scripture examine our lives so that we can grow in truth, walk in freedom, and live out our true identity in Christ.

This is Michael Jerome. Thanks for joining me. So if you listen to our last episode, we talked about looking backwards, taking that step back. Not to blame her parents or live in the past or to dig up pain simply for the sake of digging it up.

But to understand what may have been shaping the way one relates, responds, communicates, or protect themselves. Sometimes a person standing in front of you is triggering a story that started long before they arrived.

The Daughter of a Demanding Father: A Case Study

The story of what is happening in your relationships, like dating relationships, friendships, family relationships, workplace relationships, church relationships, authority relationships, and of course a marriage relationship if you're married. And as I said, today I want to introduce a real life story of a female client who is married.

She and her husband came in for marriage counseling. The marriage was the presenting problem, but it wasn't the whole problem. And you know, that's an important distinction to make in counseling when people come in with issues.

The presenting problem isn't always the root problem. In fact, most times it never is. The couple was experiencing marital difficulties that all couples experience.

But as counseling progressed, you know, patterns began to emerge, begin to impact those. Her husband could be quite demanding. And when she wanted to respond, communicate, and be heard, she couldn't because when she experienced that demanding behavior, she would often, she would just shut down or close up.

Old Patterns with New People

The question became: Why does this particular dynamic have so much power over you? And she didn't really have much words for that. And that's where looking backward became important. Her family of origin.

The pattern started earlier. And so I schedule a one-on-one with her. And here's what we discovered. So the one-on-one I schedule was with just the wife to kind of talk through some of these things.

What we discovered is she had a demanding dad. She desperately wanted his approval. And that approval was difficult to come by.

I think he was in military. So she learned that pleasing him was important. Being fully open wasn't always easy, though. And there was a pattern of responding to demanding authority by becoming quiet, guarded or shutting down.

Now put that pattern next to what was happening in her marriage. Now her husband wasn't her father, but something about the relational dynamic was familiar. And that distinction actually matters in a relationship.

Survival Strategies and Relational Wounds

Her husband and her dad, they weren't the same person, but some of the emotional dynamics she experienced with her dad were showing up again in her marriage. You see that? And so, I mean, so we can replay old patterns with new people.

This is probably not new to you. Now, if you're listening to this and you're single, you might be thinking, okay, that's great for the married people, but I'm not married. I'm not in a relationship.

Well, actually, this is exactly why looking backward matters before getting into another relationship if you currently aren't in one. Because you don't have to wait until you get married or get into a relationship to discover your patterns.

I mean, pay attention. Pay attention to what happens when somebody disappoints you, to how you respond to authority. Pay attention to whether you struggle to say no or whether you need people's approval.

Do you shut down when somebody challenges you? Those patterns don't magically disappear when you get married or into a relationship. In fact, marriage or intimate relationship can give those patterns a bigger stage.

We often don't realize we're responding to today's person with yesterday's survival strategy. And here's some possible examples that I want to throw out at you at this time.

A child who learned to avoid conflict may become an adult who shuts down. A girl who learned that love must be earned may become a woman who is a chronic people pleaser, particularly in romantic relationships.

A teenager whose voice wasn't welcome may struggle to speak up as an adult, like maybe in a classroom setting. Someone who learned that emotions create problems may disconnect from their emotions.

Biblical Perspective: The Transformation of Paul

Like this client in a romantic relationship. Hey, your family of origin may explain a pattern, doesn't excuse a pattern. And it doesn't have to become your destiny.

Now, back to my client. Here's where the actual breakthrough came. She began to see herself differently. As she recognized the connection between dad and her husband, she began to notice something.

She was losing her voice in these conflicts with her husband. I mean, it felt like to her, like she literally couldn't speak. You know, that feeling I can't speak, but it wasn't that she couldn't audible, said that she wasn't audible, that that was the issue.

But the old pattern was telling her when someone is demanding, stay quiet, don't rock the boat, don't risk rejection, don't make things worse. But now she could recognize the pattern while it was happening.

Recognition created a new possibility. I mean, she could ask, Am I responding to my husband or to an old pattern? What am I afraid will happen if I speak up?

What am I actually feeling? What do I need to communicate in this moment? And what boundary do I need to express?

See all of these different things we began to explore and talk about and work through. Now, I want to put a biblical story on the film room screen here for a moment.

Not because the story is identical to my client's story, because it isn't, but because this story in the book of Galatians, I would say give us a picture, a powerful one at that, of something we need to understand. Where you came from does not have to determine where you're going.

In Galatians chapter one, the apostle Paul talks about his former way of life and the way he grew up. And he grew up as a Jew and he learned a lot. He had a great upbringing.

He says he was advancing in Judaism beyond many of his peers. He was extremely zealous for the traditions of his fathers and his elders. In other words, his formation mattered.

What he had been taught and how he had been formed had shaped the way he understood the world and ultimately how he lived. And the way he lived for a while is he was persecuting Christians and throwing them into prison because it was clashing with his views as a Jew.

Christianity was very new and it felt very threatening to many of the zealous Jews. And so Paul was struggling with the new things he was hearing about this new group.

But then there was an encounter that he had with Jesus followed by a shift. He talks about that in Galatians 1, verse 15 and 16, where he says: "But when God who set me apart from my mother's womb and called me by his grace was pleased to reveal his son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles," that very statement, that revelation changed the trajectory of his life.

The man who had been persecuting the church became the man who proclaimed Christ to the Gentiles. Now, Paul's past was real. I mean, his formation was real.

And the patterns that he developed were real. But they weren't final. I mean, that statement, "but when God was pleased to reveal his son in me," understanding that truth made the difference for my client.

Moving from Awareness to Agency

That God is pleased to reveal something in me so that He might develop something beautiful within me. And having that understanding is so awesome. I mean, God is pleased to reveal His Son in us.

He is also pleased to reveal things about our past that trip us up and keep us stuck in patterns we're tired of repeating. And that revealing leads to healing and puts us on the road to something great.

For Paul, was preaching the gospel to the Gentiles. For my client, was being able to engage with her husband in a way that isn't stuck in childish patterns.

For you, what would that look like? What would that look like for you? God is pleased to reveal the Son in you, giving you his Holy Spirit, but what else might he be trying to reveal?

Maybe something that can give you a new purpose and passion and calling, a new career path or a relationship. And so my client, she was able to go from awareness to, I have agency.

I mean, God gave her the ability and responsibility to grow and put away the childish responses to her husband that were impacting her marriage. Now, listen to me.

When I use the word childish, I know I've said that a couple of times, I am in no way, shape, or form using it in a demeaning or derogative manner. The childish term, that definition comes from a Greek word, the word Nepios, that Paul uses in Galatians.

It means an infant, a minor, or someone who is untrained or unskilled. That's what I mean by that. And so my client was not skilled or trained to respond to her husband in an adult way.

I was able to teach her this skill through our sessions together. Now she can speak up when her boundaries and limitations aren't being respected. She owns her response instead of automatically reverting to shutting down.

During our time together, exploring her family of origin, looking backward wasn't the destination. It was a doorway to something new, a new relating, awareness, which led to choice and agency and a different response.

So, what does this mean for you? I would say, man, take a second to think about your patterns in relating that aren't healthy or helpful. Like shutting down, perhaps, or maybe yelling, tantrums, defensiveness.

And if that's the case, you know, where have you seen these patterns before? Where have you seen them before? Who did you learn to become in order to receive love?

What happened when you disagree respectfully? What about when you express anger or when you cried? What happened when you failed or needed something?

Listen, you may discover that some of the things you call your personality are actually patterns you learned in order to navigate your environment. And so that's why the challenge I've given about the courageous step of looking backwards.

As I've said before, the presenting problem isn't always the root problem. If you are responding to an adult relationship in your life in ways that reflect childlike traits, it is important to look backward at the root problem.

I mean, we all have heard of the term, let's get to the root of the problem, right? Let's get to the root of it. I mean, if it's something that's chronic—what I mean by that, as far as duration, frequency and intensity, and there's no growth or change—then you know, that's not a relationship problem.

That is a root buried in family of origin, a family of origin wound that's causing a relationship problem, whether that's in marriage, dating, friendship, coworker or an authority figure. And if you listen to the last episode, this was the reason why I gave the family origin inventory challenge.

Because your family of origin is already influencing the way you relate today, anyway. So becoming aware of that will be good for you in future relationships.

And let me disclose some of the ways I've struggled with some of these traits that were not healthy and in some ways still do to this day. I haven't arrived. I still tend to shut down when someone disagrees with me.

I find myself overexplaining things. Sometimes I overexplain myself. I struggle at times to receive criticism.

I sometimes feel like I'm responsible for everyone else's emotions. For a long time, I didn't know how to establish a boundary without feeling guilty. These are things that I'm still working on.

I mean, praise God. I've seen some growth in these areas. Man, it's been encouraging to see how far I've come.

What is it for you? Are you able to identify things that, okay, I can see how this is connected to family origin and how this is operating in my relationships today? Because you can't begin changing a pattern you haven't learned to recognize.

Film Room Takeaways for Your Life

And so we're going to move into some film room takeaways as we wrap up this episode. The presenting problem isn't always the root problem. Gotta look deeper.

Your relationship may trigger a pattern that started long before the relationship. Your family of origin may explain your patterns, but it doesn't have to determine your future.

Awareness gives you the opportunity to choose a different response. And you don't have to lose your voice to establish, maintain, keep peace in your life.

Sometimes the first step forward isn't another step forward. Sometimes it's a courageous look backward.

If this episode is making you recognize that some of the things you're struggling with today may have deeper roots than you realize, you don't have to figure all of that out by yourself. Through a Space of Grace Counseling, I offer a complimentary 30-minute discovery call where we can talk about your story, where you're feeling stuck, and whether biblical counseling is the right next step for you.

Hey, there's no obligation, no pressure. It's simply a graceful space to begin unpacking what you're carrying. You will find the link to schedule in the show notes.

Father, thank you for giving us the courage to look honestly at our stories. Help us understand what has shaped us without becoming trapped by it.

Give us wisdom to recognize unhealthy patterns, courage to use the voice you've given us, and grace to respond differently. Remind us that our past may be part of our story, but it does not have the final word. In Jesus' name, amen.

In the next episode, we're going to put some common ideas from counseling and church ministry on the film room screen. Ideas that sound helpful, but may actually keep us from going deeper.

We're going to examine three myths: one, that therapy or self help can fix us; two, that we can just pray or believe our way through complex struggles; and three, that simply telling people to connect with others creates healthy community. Because sometimes the problem isn't that we don't have enough information or enough people around us.

It's that we haven't gone deep enough in our relationship with God and His truth. So that's where we're going in the biblical film room next time. So hit that subscribe button, please.

I want to also ask you to like us on YouTube and anywhere you listen to your favorite podcast. And you know I'm going to ask you to share the episode.

It just might bring clarity to someone's spiritual direction. Thank you again for joining me today. Hey, go be a world changer, but not a stranger.

I'll see you next time in the biblical film room where God's word becomes the replay that changes your life. Talk to you soon. Adios.

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