Summary: Have you ever looked out on the world (listened to too much news) and wondered, "why can't people just get along?"<br><br>We all want roughly the same things: a happy life, experience love and family, prosper and live. But we all seem ready to roll over others to achieve these goals, desperate in our feelings of lacking.<br><br>Indeed, global peace and recognizing each other's shared needs and desires seem unimaginable. It is easy to feel hopeless and powerless in that reckoning because even many of our close relationships are at odds. Our country seems more at war within in recent years, and the fighting spills over into families. We've lost sight of each other while entrenching ourselves in our camps.<br><br>Do you feel that tug of toxicity – from entrenched opinions about thorny subjects like religion and politics – with some people in your life? I do. But wait, we must have some influence, if not on the world stage, at least in our backyards with family and community.<br><br>Our families are a microcosm of humanity, a path to understanding our bonds to the larger world. Through family and friendships, we gain insights into how to be humane. So, when intimate ties crash, we can feel lost not just in who we are but also in what purpose our lives even serve.<br><br>If you've struggled to find peace within and without, this episode of The Delicious Story is for you. Here I chat with Elena Greenberg, a practicing attorney, mediator, and professional mentor.<br>Elena walks us through steps and ideas to help us find common ground and harmony with family, not just for the holidays, but the long haul, too.<br><br>Our Separateness <br>We are each unique in our views of the world. You've probably realized this when you've shared an experience, witnessed an event, or even read the same book with others and noted that you don't "see" the facts or their meaning the same way.<br><br>We each interpret the outside "reality" based on our prism of life knowledge and prejudices. And the truth of the variations of perspective is that sometimes objective facts become irrelevant. Often, two people can't agree on what is, infact fact. We become stranded in subjective opinion instead.<br><br>And what's more, the person you are now and the opinions you hold dear may not be relevant later as you grow and change. Thus, you can't be certain that the opinions you believe today, will be yours by tomorrow.<br><br>So, in theory and based on experience, we get that we're different. And we either come to terms with the differences, find them exciting or unimportant or deny they exist at all. We often seek those we believe are the "same," because differences can cause us internal stress.<br><br>When it comes to strongly held opinions, like those of politics and religion, we become entrenched in the "facts" (code for opinions) that we believe even at the expense of important relationships. And the more we insist on our rightness, the less we hear or seek to understand any other point of view. Growth is not possible.<br><br>Finding Our Common Ground<br>I've been thinking a lot about estrangement in families lately since I've read Karl Pillemer's book Fault Lines: Fractured Families and How to Mend Them. Throughout the book, he interviews numerous people experiencing estrangement from family members.<br><br>Pillemer suggests that these fractured bonds don't serve us and leave holes in our family ties that impact generations into the future. He also tells stories of those who decide they want to end the estrangement.<br><br>Reconciliation hinges on a few points. To mend, all involved realize that the past disagreement is no longer critical. They also recognize they don't require an apology for an old wrong. And ultimately, the path to a relationship lies in going forward.<br><br>If you've been teetering on the brink of fissures in your family because of toxic topics, try to turn a corner for the...
