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I mentioned before about influence. Please, please, PLEASE do not confuse the word influence with manipulation and control. While the terms may seem synonymous, they are completely different. I also mentioned before that a war with the adversarial ex cannot take place if there is a disturbance on the home front. Only when you, and your SO stand united do you have a better chance of achieving a favorable outcome to your situation. So how does one achieve this harmony and improve the family dynamic?

This is at the heart of Sun Tzu’s next lesson “You must blend and harmonize your forces before making encampment. Without harmony, no military expedition may be undertaken.”

Achieving harmony in a blended family home can be challenging at best and near impossible at its worst. It’s a problem that bogs us down day-to-day. You, as a stepparent, have certain “realms” of influence in your family home. To explain this, I’ll be diving once again into the 5 elements of Chinese astrology (water, fire, wood, metal, and earth ) to explain this concept. If you examine these closely, you can readily see which realm of influence you are strong in and which ones you are weak in. None of these elements are always fixed. Homes evolve just as family’s evolve. If you read the descriptions, you can easily see which elements tend to be stable in your homes and which are in a constant state of flux.

In order to achieve harmony (or, at least, to strive for it) one must first perform an analysis of how the basic elements affect our family home.

Earth: Earth is the stabilizing factor in your home. Should a conflict or challenge arise, the home with the most earth will readily approach, address and stabilize the situation. Every house has a foundation, so too does every family have a foundation. Too little earth means conflicts in the family home spark often and spiral out of control before they settle. However, a family with too much earth is probably dead set in their routines and don’t do much to venture out of the home environment. How do you stabilize earth? If we are to borrow lessons from Sun Tzu, the best approach is to empower the individual family members around you. Give everyone a chance to weigh in on the matter before a decision is made. However Sun Tzu cautions that if you seek a quick resolution to a problem on the home front, you must move slowly. If however, the problem is of no consequence to you, then you must move quickly. This sounds odd but remember that stress and emotion are factors in conflict situations (like an argument between you and your spouse) and they are inversely proportional to the challenge they present. This means, that a high level challenge, needs a cool, level-headed logical approach, whereas a low level problem, needs to be squashed quickly in order to prove that you are quick to act and dominant in the situation.

Fire: Fire is the dynamic/moving force of the home. Fire is almost the exact opposite of Earth. It is outgoing, flamboyant and rich. Fire can also be synonymous with finances. He or she with the most fire tends to exhibit the most financial control. It doesn’t necessarily mean they have the most money, but that they have the most control over money flow. Too little fire means there is very little accomplished; chores are often neglected and family life just seems – well - boring. Too much fire means that too many tasks are taken on all at once and more often than not, everyday family obligations seem overwhelming. So how does one stabilize Fire? More often than not, you can’t. Unlike earth, where you can modify your approach to the challenge, fire will require you to do nothing, or rather let another family member handle the problem. Problems produced by fire (like money, and tight schedules) necessitate the need for you to delegate. Ask another family member to help and when done you thank them for their effort. Fire requires you to be everywhere at once which is impossible. This is why relying on other family members is important.

Water: Water is closely associated with thought. It is the element of water that makes a house a home. Without water, there is no history, or feeling of identity. Water in your home can best be summarized as the impression a stranger gets when walking into your home. A stranger will see things that will right-away give them an impression of what your family is like; who it’s members are and what they are like. Water is also the element that is the most tricky to deal with in a blended family because – more often than not – the family identity is either an unknown or in conflict with itself. Family identity sparks emotions that can be confusing, especially to a child that spends time between two homes. Too much or too little of the water element in a home spell family disaster. In fact, feng shui experts caution to not put any water symbols (like fountains or pictures of water) in the bedroom (for reasons which should be obvious). Since water is an element of thought, and thoughts grow and mature, so too can water be symbolized by a child’s growing maturity, curiosity and intellect. This is why water affects children more readily than adults. Water, for an adult, can be symbolized by an increase in your affection or admiration for your children or for your SO. If there is not enough water, it means you are aloof, uncaring or disengaged. Too much water means you are too dependent on someone, or something (like an addiction) in order to be comfortable with your own identity. Okay, I know it is bugging you…”Why should I not have any water symbol in the bedroom?” The answer is simple. When you and your SO are *ahem* engaged with one another, the LAST thing you need is a sudden break in momentum. That’s what water does, like a sudden downpour, it breaks your chain of thought. It makes you stop and think. Water makes you wonder and worry (i.e. “OMG! I hope my partner is being satisfied! If he isn’t satisfied, does this mean I am bad at sex!?” Water inhibits that intimate spontaneity. So how does one stabilize water? The answer is not an easy one but solving the problem of water requires persistence and time. Water is a force that can move mountains but it doesn’t do it overnight. Water requires tenacity but a gentle hand. Water requires strength but not brute force. In other words, solving the problem of your thoughts may require you ask, “Where is my place in this family?”. It is a question that you may need to dwell on before the answer finds you.

Wood: Wood is likened as an element of comfort. If you think about it, the objects most common in your home is most likely to be made from wood. Wood is the element which makes your home a place where people want to spend their time there. So when applied to the family dynamic it represents your ability (or inability) to keep the family together and engaged with one another. A family that likes to chat around the diner table while enjoying a nice home-cooked meal is said to have the element of wood in their favor. Those that order take out and eat their slices of pizza secluded their own rooms is said to be weak in wood. So how does one stabilize wood? Earth, fire and water tend to be calculating factors in the home but wood is far more practical in nature. So stabilizing wood simply requires you to be more practical. I’ll explain this with an example. Let’s say you are having guests over for a party. You are madly rushing to get things tidy. You find yourself rushing and getting stressed out. Wood helps you see the grand scheme of things. Wood will tell you “Hey? Do your friends REALLY care if you have dirty dishes in the sink? Your friends won’t judge you and are looking forward to coming here! Don’t stress out! Relax and enjoy being a host!”. Wood gives you the chance to see the “end-game” and focus on what truly matters. It also gives you a more global perspective.

Metal: Metal is your moral compass. Or rather, it is your family’s moral compass. You wouldn’t be with your SO unless you shared some of each other’s moral values. Keep in mind this isn’t the ability to separate right from wrong but your ability to share and guide the moral compass of your family. Obviously too little metal means that you and someone else in your family are at odds over some issue on principal. Too much means, you or someone in your family is a bit too preachy and spend more time trying to convince the other their way is the “right way” . So how does one stabilize metal? Well metal is already a finished product. Wood, fire, earth and water are “raw” elements but metal has already been tempered with your life’s experiences and your upbringing. That experience can benefit your step-kids and other members of your family if you know how to share them.

Now that I have laid out the elements that play a part in the family home; try this as an exercise for yourself. What if you immediately removed yourself from the family right now, what would happen to your family? Hopefully you can see what elements that you have been dominant over. Again, I stress that having an influence in your home doesn’t necessarily mean that you have control. Some of you may be saying that you possess very little, to no influence in your family; which is why many of us disengage. I won’t talk about disengaging because that is a separate topic altogether but one of the whole purposes behind disengaging is to forget about things that you cannot and will never have control over in order to minimize the emotional pain it causes. In my case, I have disengaged over certain things in the household that I know will only cause me grief. However, by disengaging myself I am inadvertently influencing the family dynamic (namely the water element).

So for many of us stepparents, it is difficult to find harmony in the blended family life but that doesn’t mean that we cannot influence our family life. We owe it to ourselves and to our family to at least try.

Next: “Be extremely subtle even to the point of formlessness. Be extremely mysterious even to the point of soundlessness. Thereby you can be the director of the opponent’s fate”