Interesting blog this week Wilma, one that has hit a little bit of a nerve with me. This is a good thing of course as it makes for some great in depth conversations around the topic. )

I respect your thoughts on this and commend you for taking action and responsibility in your life to make to better, however I do not believe that this is an ideal solution.

Sorry this is so long, but I have a lot to say on this issue! I, like almost every other families out there have “Aunty” and “Uncle” dominators in my family so I know exactly what you are talking about.

I do not believe that not inviting the troublesome Aunty and Uncle without telling them and not being up front and talking to them about why you are not inviting them will actually cause more drama and more turmoil in your life than just putting up with them at Christmas get together. I believe that this will cause much drama and pain in the family for many years to come when Aunty and Uncle find out and are very resentful about it. I don’t know that they will get over it.

Am I saying to just put up with it? No, not at all.

As Andrew mentioned in an earlier comment, most people do not intentionally behave to hurt others, even though sometimes it really looks like they do! Most people are just so “unconscious” that they really have no idea what they are doing and how it affects other around them, this doesn’t make them bad, it just makes them unaware.

Excluding people without dealing with the core issue is in my opinion not living from a place of love and respect.

My suggestion would be to talk to Aunty and Uncle before Christmas and talk about how you are feeling about the situation and let them know that you do not want a repeat of every other Christmas.

A great way of doing this and confronting someone about how their behaviour is hurting you is to sit them down and have an open conversation with them – face to face. Use a technique called a criticism sandwich. This is where you start off with a positive comment about them. “I love it when you …”, or “You are an amazing person because …”. Then you go into the criticism, BUT you don’t make it about them, you make it about yourself. “When you do . . . , it makes me feel . . . “. If it continues then I will not be able to see you anymore. Finish off with another compliment and then pause to hear their feedback. It works amazing well and because you are not going in yelling them down they tend not to get defensive and really hear what you are saying.

Then Aunty and Uncle have a choice. They decide not to come as they do not want to change their behaviour or they decide they want to come and change the way they behave.

We used this on two of our family members recently. They kept breaking agreements with us and we were not going to put up with it anymore. We did exactly what I outlined above and it was amazing. They really opened up to us and we found out the real issue of why it was happening, which was nothing to do with us and they did not even know they were hurting us. Our relationship with them is now so much stronger and they treat us with much more love and respect because we brought it up with them.

Is this easy? No way! Is this scary? You Bet ya! But will it make your life filled with much joy, love and laughter.

I know that dealing with these relationship issues in this open way is scary and confronting, but it is such a powerful way to a much more peaceful life, where relationships grow from love and respect rather than exclusion.

So that is my opinion, take out of it what is useful for you. But whatever you decide to do, have a fantastic Christmas and may it be filled with much love, fun and laughter.