For Bill's fellow councilors, this seemingly inconsiderate practice was very disruptive. At first, since Bill was known to be an extremely busy professional, they were prepared to assume that he had been unavoidably delayed. But when history repeated itself meeting after meeting, they began to wonder..

Then one day, sleepy little town was overtaken by a crisis, and mayor asked his councilors to attend an emergency session - at 7 following morning. And you guessed it - Bill turned up at 7:10 precisely.

This seemed to confirm mayor's suspicion's that something more than unavoidable circumstances lay behind Bill's habitual latecoming. After meeting he called over offending councilman for a private chat.

To mayor's surprise, Bill accepted rebuke with good grace. Punctuality had never been his strongest point, he pleaded, and it had never dawned on him that his bad habit was upsetting everybody so. But from this point, he assured mayor, he was a reformed man...

The day of next council gathering came around, and sure enough, Bill was among first to arrive.

"What's matter Bill?" jeered one of his colleagues. "Is your watch half an hour fast?"

"Surely, you were locked out of your house!" added a second, in a somewhat derisive tone.

Right until end of his term of office, Bill was never on time for a council meeting again.

*********

This is a story that actually happened, although I have changed some of details.

Three or four decades ago, an educational psychologist by name of Haim Ginott caused quite a stir when he suggested to parents and teachers that they try a new way of communicating with children. He urged them to unlearn language of rejection - blaming and shaming, ridiculing and belittling, threatening and bribing - and to learn a new language of acceptance.

In his bestselling books, Ginott repeatedly wrote about need for "congruent communication." By this, he meant that way we communicate should be congruent, or consistent, with our objective.

What a pity that so much of our communication isn't!

We see this clearly from our story. Had his colleagues given Bill some badly needed encouragement in breaking a difficult habit, everybody would have come out a winner. But instead of drawing him near, they pushed him away.

All same, I'll take my chances. I think my shoulders are broad enough.

I stand by counselor's response 100%.

The questioner (let's call her Jane) was married to a divorcee. Her husband (John) had to pay a certain sum of money every month to his previous wife as alimony, or whatever. He had just started a new business and was passing through a financial sticky patch. The obligation to his ex-wife, on top of everything else, was putting John under a lot of pressure.

Jane was a working person and gladly helped to pay family debts. She never thought twice about it. But could she be expected to contribute in this case?

Surely, reasoned Jane, her husband's financial commitment to somebody to whom he had been married previously had nothing to do with her? Yes, she and John were life partners and she was happy to share all his burdens. But even for what happened in a previous life, so to speak? Wasn't that going too far?

"I must confess I don't really understand your question," counselor gently told Jane after listening intently to her dilemma.

"You and John are husband and wife. John has a debt. He's struggling to pay it. What difference does it make what debt is for? It's a debt, period!"

The counselor smiled warmly at Jane before she continued. "His problems are your problems. You're in this together. Why on earth shouldn't you help pay debt? If, after all, it's difficult for you to accept this, it must be that there's some deeper problem in your marriage..."

And that's it.

Now, it's important not to misunderstand counselor, or me. I don't want your blood pressure to hit roof! We have to keep cool heads and put everything in proper perspective.

First of all, she wasn't implying, of course, that John now had a licence to sit back, put his legs up, and meditate blissfully about higher meaning of life, while his dear and ever obliging spouse worked like a donkey to pay price of his past.

Not at all. I should think that's pretty obvious, but I have to stress it just in case.

Secondly, when we talk about husband and wife being full partners in business of living, about sharing each other's burdens - financial or otherwise - no less than each other's joys, we are not saying for one moment that either party must contribute more than is reasonable.

In case of our story, Jane was a high-earning professional. In other instances, a wife may bring in little or no income, for any of a number of reasons. It may not be desirable that she be working at all.