Honestly, I thought the title of the song was weird especially in our sex-crazed culture. Call me “out of touch” but I’m not sure it needed coming back in so much as it needed dialing down. Does everything in life revolve around sex or being sexy? I don’t think so. We are more than one dimensional right?
The song made me think about the question, “What do we need to bring back?” It didn’t take me too long to figure out the answer, at least from my perspective. What’s missing in our culture is not sexy, it’s respect. We have sexy coming at us from every direction, but respect is often hard to find.
What we see more today is disrespect. It has seeped into every social institution in our country: family, school, work, government, and religion.
In the bulk of my counseling and coaching practice if I were to boil down to one word the problems couples and families experience, it is respect. I will often say this to my clients and they agree. A common lament is, “I don’t feel respected by my (you fill in the blank).”
About a year ago I decided to write a book on the subject. The title of my book is reflected in the title of this article, “Bringing Respect Back: Communicating Without the Conflict”. I am writing about bringing respect back in our culture beginning with our closest interpersonal relationships. At the time of this writing I have eight of the ten chapters completed. You will hear more about the book in future articles.
In the meantime, I would like you to examine your world and see which is more prominent, respect or disrespect. Observe interactions between spouses, siblings, and parent-children. What do you notice? Pay attention to how things are conducted in the workplace. Do people treat each other respectfully? Or is it everyone for themselves? Do the same with society in general. What happened to waving a “thank you” when someone lets you enter traffic? Rarely happens anymore.
In my book, I talk about how we can bring respect back in our personal lives, relationships, and in our culture. It is possible, however it begins with each one of us taking control of our attitudes and actions. Imagine what your life, your family, your world would be like if people were simply respectful. I’m all for bringing respect back. How about you?
Bringing Respect Back
In 2006 Justin Timberlake rocked the musical world with his hit “Sexy Back”. In an interview Timberlake stated that the first line that came to him was “bringing sexy back”. Of course the song struck a chord (no pun intended) with the audience and rose to the top of the Billboard charts for several weeks and won Timberlake multiple awards.
