The choice is usually hard. Either we can be protected from feelings in an attempt to be safe or we can express feelings and be open to the joy and the pain they create. Since protecting from pain frustrates all intimate possibilities, the sharing of pain is the key to releasing us to Intimate Love.
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Although a request may hope to change the other person, it is not an attempt to control if the partner is free to say “No” without disapproval, and free to say “Yes” without feeling a loss of integrity. Often a demand may sound like a request, as in “Honey, would you take out the garbage?” If the response “No, I’m busy right now” gets back a congenial “Okay,” then the question has been a request. But if the retort is a sarcastic “Thanks a lot,” or silent anger, then the question has been an attempt to control.
