We can thus see that the functions of the contact rebus, as previously described, correspond to those that are concealed within the contact rebuses’ visible content. We can therefore henceforth refer to them as the contact rebuses’ concealed functions, ‘concealed’ because they are functions linked to the actual transmutation of the contact rebus and therefore not directly observable (Motivational Work, Part 1: Values and Theory, page 402 – 418).
The surface of the contact rebus also has an important part to play in the relational dynamic. There are therefore also visible functions in the contact rebus, by which we mean the observable transmuted content of the contact rebus. This content consolidates, by virtue of its very visibility, the level of contact and degree of transmutation that the couple has attained, and in revealing it to each other, the couple affirms the level of bonding that they have attained.
At the same time, the surface of each rebound prepares for the next. In other words, the positive rebound contains the seeds of the negative, and if solved, the content of the negative rebound becomes the conflict-filled emotional content concealed in the positive rebound and a new contact rebus that tests and hides the positive feelings that will go to make up, in transmuted form, the next positive rebound (which is slightly less transmuted than before). At the same time, it will conceal a negative content through its transmutation.
If the positive and negative rebounds are solved as they arise, the couple will become more intimate with each other and with themselves personally. Their contact rebuses will therefore start to emerge increasingly in their proper guises, while the real positive emotions and conflicts will become more manifest and less transmuted. Consolidation thus entails a reduction of the degree of transmutation. The couple’s greater intimacy also renders their conflicts less charged, their dissonance less pronounced, and their genuine positive emotions more powerful – and their bond gradually strengthens.
Case Study
Sandra and Gabriel have been married for 25 years. They have three children, the youngest of whom has just left home. The couple demonstrates their love for each other in various ways: Gabriel might surprise Sandra with flowers, and Sandra might take the initiative in the bedroom.
While their children were at home, their couple’s contact rebus came to a standstill, which expressed itself in the way that Sandra would criticize Gabriel for not pulling his weight in the home, while he would refuse to do more housework, claiming that Sandra was wrong to criticize him and is unnecessarily angry. Now that they have been alone for a week, the degree of transmutation in the couple’s contact rebus increases, which in itself can elicit a solution.
The higher degree of transmutation means that Sandra and Gabriel argue more with each other about the household chores, and start to take up habits that alienate them from each other: Gabriel sits watching TV late into the night, and Sandra goes to bed early without saying goodnight. When the positive rebound comes, they are able to discuss how they have grown apart over the past few years (when the children lived at home) and put their parental role above their own emotional relationship.
After this conversation, Gabriel decides to change his attitude towards the housework, Sandra becomes less critical, and they both try to devote more time to each other. Discussions can still arise about the distribution of labor at home, but they understand each other in a new way and can more easily settle their disputes.
Discussion
Their new life context makes it possible for Sandra and Gabriel to solve another contact rebus in their bonding process, the one at which they had stagnated over the 25 years of their life as a family unit. Thanks to the increase in transmutation, the couple manage to move on in their relationship and the bond between them grows stronger and more intimate.
People base their relationships on what consolidation has made visible and mutually accepted. They have the energy stored within the already solved contact rebuses to help them tackle the next contact rebus. Its concealed functions enable change and growth and its visible functions achieve a consolidation of the current situation and an opportunity for balance.
The tenses, if you will, of the rebus’s visible function are present and past, as what has previously occurred is affirmed in the here and now; those of its concealed functions are present and future, as the here and now contains the potential for change. The visible part of the contact rebus is the aggregate manifestation of the solved positive and negative contact rebuses, or, in other words, the visible component of the couple’s relationship.
It is the bridge upon which life energy can be conducted without the need for prior testing. This means that the contact rebus’s visible functions are the same as the relationship’s functions.
The concept of the temporal contact rebus develops and broadens that of the contact rebus. When the different contact rebuses are placed along a timeline, a pattern emerges in which the rebuses are not sharply defined, but merged into one another to produce one meta-contact rebus. Simultaneously, each individual contact rebus is interwoven with others in a special pattern that we call the relationship.