Stepfamily living: Detachment

One of the biggest problems in stepfamily communities is the concept of what it means to “Detach.” In theory, it sounds so wise and smart. Practiced in stepfamilies though-what’s happening is not detachment as it’s intended. There are so many women running with detach as their biggest wisdom to give another woman and gosh, I really wish they would stop telling women to do that without any mindfulness or deeper consciousness on what happens to a woman’s heart, or what a child experiences when we give someone advice like “just detach.” without expanding upon what that means, feels like, looks like and how you know you are applying it.
 
To detach doesn’t mean to suffer in silence and have that suffering leak out every other weekend. Having the ability to detach is much broader and requires something much greater of us than deciding we have to shut a part of our hearts down and not care. Detachment is actually caring very much while getting out of the way- in the places you have no control of or business being in anyway. Detachment does not mean: withhold love, ignore while secretly seething or invalidate someone’s existence. These are the elements those “statistics,” aren’t measuring. How can you actually measure that anyway? Many humans in stepfamilies are not detached, they are just disconnected and disconnection puts relationships in a danger zone.
If you have mastered the art of detachment, there isn’t much to complain about because you’re free now to see the beauty that exists because you’re no longer focused in places that aren’t yours anyway. It really does take practice, time, space and reverence to become a master in the art of what it means to detach. 

Lovingly,
​Christina Marie