The Rules of Love, 3rd Edition

RULE 80

Don’t pressurize your family just because you can

We’ve had a couple of Rules about how to cope when your family aren’t behaving perfectly. But you’re part of the family too and sometimes, just maybe, you’re not perfect yourself. So here’s a Rule for the benefit of the rest of your family, and I hope they follow it themselves too.

One of the things that contributes to family problems is that we sometimes treat our families in ways we wouldn’t dream of treating anyone else. And they rightly get irritated. If your friends ask you to take your shoes off before you come into the house, you do it. But if family ask, we’re much more likely to reply, ‘You shouldn’t be so precious about your house’, or ‘It’s fine, my shoes are clean’. This is ...