Category: MATURITY

My Answer to the Question, Are People Who Cry When Criticized Immature?

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date August 10, 2014
7 Comments on My Answer to the Question, Are People Who Cry When Criticized Immature?

Recently, I wrote a post titled, “Responding to Criticism by Crying: Is it a Sign of Immaturity?” In that post I explained that I had, in earlier posts, put forth a model of how to respond maturely to criticism. To help readers to rate their own skill level, and that of others, I had outlined five levels of maturity. Level 1 was viewed as the most immature level, level 2 as a little more mature, and so on (see HERE for a full description of the first 4 levels of maturity, and see HERE for a description of level 5, the most mature level). Level 1 had been described as follows:

1. This level requires displaying one or more of the following:

Weeps or sobs with tears or pouts
Physically attacks the criticizer
Damages property

As you can see from this description of level 1, I had come to believe that weeping or sobbing with tears was best to view as one of the most immature responses. I then explained several reasons why I had come to believe that, but I won’t repeat them here. I then wrote that since I came up with the five levels of maturity, I had met some individuals who seem rather remarkably mature to me in many ways, and yet they had revealed to me that they find themselves crying quite often when they are criticized. They say that they are very sensitive individuals, that they don’t hurt anyone or anything when they go through this experience, and that I should consider removing crying from the description of the lowest level. As I thought about this, I thought it would help me if I propose a change to my readers, ask for feedback, and only then make my decision whether or not to make the change. I ended that post as follows:

Proposed Change

Weeping, sobbing and crying will only be viewed as the lowest level of maturity if the person responding to criticism does nothing else but that, or if he or she does that along with the other lowest level responses such as physically attacking the criticizer or damaging property. If, after crying, he or she then begins to display responses consistent with level 4 or 5, crying will no longer be viewed as a sign of immaturity.

Although I could make this change after I get some feedback, I hasten to point out that it won’t change the fact that many people will still consider crying in the face of criticism as a sign of immaturity. Some will lose respect for those who cry.

Perhaps these sensitive individuals can help to reduce the lack of respect that they might encounter. They can explain that their sensitivity helps them to more deeply consider the criticism. Moreover, they might suggest that for people who feel uncomfortable around someone crying, they can provide the criticism at first by email, snail mail or voice mail. This will allow the sensitive person time to process the criticism. Then, a follow-up meeting to further process the criticism can be arranged.

I hope to hear from readers on this.

After I published this, I received more feedback on this post than anything I had previously written. It came mostly from several Facebook groups I belong to, but also from a couple of professional organizations as well. Today I’d like to share with you several of these comments, and then provide my new description of level 1.

The Feedback

The first three comments came from psychologists.

I have read your material, and tend to agree w/ you. It appears to me to qualify for a level 1 response, as it reflects a lack of (age appropriate ) skill development (if it is not a reflection of serious cognitive inefficiency in general). It does invite further negative input from the criticizer and others. It increases the victims sense of vulnerability. There are many other alternatives which could be modeled or practiced — even if they are not available for immediate accessing by the victim. In this sense, I agree with Dr. Phil (who I many times don’t agree) “Fake it till you make it”

Dr. Charles Morrissey school psychologist and lic.clinical psychologist NY

Hi Jeff,

Your query is very intriguing to me. As a psychodynamic therapist, I have found that crying can occur when a criticism becomes associated with an old psychological wound that has yet to be fully processed (e.g., perhaps the criticism sounds like something painful someone heard from his/her mother repeatedly, but they did not recognize this past hurt until it was activated by the current criticism). I hope this example makes sense. I like your revision and think it takes into account such a consideration. I hope that helps!

Take care,

Ashley

Ashley Curiel, Psy.D.

Jeff, you write (I think correctly) that, regardless of any adjustments you make in your hierarchy, you “hasten to point out that it won’t change the fact that many people will still consider crying in the face of criticism as a sign of immaturity. Some will lose respect for those who cry.” I suspect that many will considering crying a sign of “weakness,” an even more damaging judgment than “immaturity” in many social and vocational settings. (I admit to some confusion about the strength-weakness continuum as it has sometimes been explained to me, where compassion was considered “weakness” and aggression a sign of “strength.”)

I wonder how much the context of the criticism matters in this analysis. If a grad school classmate told me I was “incredibly stupid” because I did not know some obscure fact about endocrinology, I could probably have shot at a Level 4 (well, at least 3) response, especially if I had been getting all As in my courses and making great progress on my dissertation while anticipating a return to a secure and fulfilling job. However, I might well cry upon hearing the same words from the chair of my dissertation committee a week before my defense, especially if the time limit on my doctoral program was almost exhausted, I was struggling to make payments on the second mortgage I had taken out to pay for the doctoral program, and my new job was contingent on my receiving the doctoral degree by the end of the school year.

You are obviously correct that most individuals cry less readily in the face of criticisms and other stresses as they become older, which does fit a “maturity” continuum, but there do seem to be individual differences in general readiness to cry when criticized, when singing the national anthem on Memorial Day, when watching a sad movie, or in moments of joy. Some folks also think there are gender differences involved.

Thanks for sharing these posts with us.

John Willis

The rest of the comments came from members of Facebook groups that I belong to.

Phoebe Âû Perlman-Miller

Thank you Jeffrey. I had a few thoughts about your article in so much as I think that we have to be careful about labelling someone who cries, as a response to criticism, as immature. I think context is important and needs to be appreciated, and the nature of the conflict or the criticism needs to be explained. Crying is a pretty normal response to grief, stress, sadness etc., and isn’t something that the “crier” should automatically be ashamed of or guilty about, nor is it a reaction to which the other party, or parties, should automatically attach shame or blame. We expect people to be able to manage their emotions and to control themselves physically, but sometimes I think that this expectation can be a little unreasonable although, again, context is everything. Crying is a reaction which is generally triggered by a heightened emotional state, and sometimes it is difficult, even for the most emotionally mature or emotionally intelligent person, to manage to balance out their threat and soothing/calming systems, depending on what has just been triggered for them. There are also, in genuine cases of distress (not the “crocodile” tear brigade), things going on in the automatic nervous system which make it difficult not to cry once the emotion has kicked in, such as the opening up of the glottis, the muscle controlling the opening from the back of the throat to the voice box, causing the “lump in the throat” feeling which often accompanies crying. Sipping water and deliberate yawning are techniques which help to release tension in throat muscles when this happens but I don’t imagine that these will automatically spring to mind when someone is in the middle of a conflict situation and, indeed, deliberate yawning might be taken the wrong way and exacerbate the matter. I think that a great proportion of those who cry when criticised do indeed use tears as part of an immature or manipulative or inappropriate response, because they know no other way of expressing or managing their distress or anger or fear etc., but I don’t think that it will be the case in every instance. I have known some of the most “together” and emotionally mature people to crack under sufficient levels of pressure (those who were criticising were certainly deliberately pushing buttons and hitting below the belt), and to cry despite obviously not wanting to, and they were certainly not wanting this physical manifestation of their emotional state to take centre stage in the interaction. Their response happened to be accompanied by some tears, but those tears were not central to their response, and certainly were not being used in a manipulative manner, nor were they accompanied by aggression or any other inappropriate behaviours, such as shouting or hitting or abuse of any kind. I think we need to look at the skills sets of both the criticisers and the criticised, and make a judgement based on the bigger picture – a somewhat wide-angled approach. Also, while I think that those who use tears to manipulate should not be allowed to gain any traction with such behaviour, I would hate to think that we “condition” people not to cry – there is a “stiff upper lip” stigma already in many societies which can be and is emotionally damaging, especially for men. We need to respect the fact that crying is natural and helpful and healing and cathartic, while also helping people manage their emotions and their conflicts using appropriate language and careful, respectful, assertive forms of communication.

Âûnty Jack

I think this depends a great deal on the type of criticism. Careful constructive criticism would be less likely to evoke tears especially if, for example, the sandwich technique was used – strength, need, strength. I think still, it is possible that someone who is tired and stressed might break down – perhaps consider that human if it is an atypical response. If the response to considered criticism and I am not talking about victimization, provoking, harassment or brutal comments, is always tears, the person may be highly manipulative, rather than immature.

Peter Rafferty

Sometimes a criticism may tap into something from childhood, to which the natural response is to cry. Crying could also be seen as mourning for a parent who criticised a child, but because of the child’s inability to cry in front of the parent, will cry in front of a therapist. Even if crying is accompanied by anger, it may display a need that the inner child is unconsciously displaying – perhaps an insecure, anxious attachment that needs to be addressed.

Kerrie Moor

Your level 1 change pleased me ..

Kerrie Moor

My response to many things are tears.:

Abrar Pirzada

Crying can only mean to show your sensitvity for a certain moment or thing!

Carmen Hipps Prettyman

IMO, crying releases all the pent up anguish that is toxic, it is a way to cleanse. On the other hand, it can also be an overwhelming emotion that can only be expressed through the release of the flow of tears….words just can’t express some of the emotions we feel…good or bad!!!

Franciane Thonet

Sometimes, criticism can remind someone of a bad place in their Life, re-open a wound that never was quite healed..I agree with no right or wrong here.

Ellen Cohen

Crying is natural and very human. If you feel that you want to cry as a response, then cry! Your feelings are your feelings. There’s no right or wrong feelings.

And so, those are some of the many thoughtful responses that I received. After giving them a great deal of thought, I have now decided that in future posts, when I describe the five levels of maturity, I’ll word the first level as follows: 1. This level requires displaying one or more of the following:

Weeps or sobs with tears or pouts and then does nothing else to address the criticism. (Some mature people are very sensitive and do cry on occasion when criticized. If they cry and also address the criticism in a manner that is consistent with level 4 or 5, crying is not viewed as a sign of immaturity.)
Physically attacks the criticizer
Damages property

Although this is my plan for the future, I am always open to hearing additional comments and suggestions for improving the wording of all of the five levels of maturity. My Best, Jeff

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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional and social intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.

Tags conflict management, conflict resolution, constructive criticism, criticism, crying, dig for the conflict, dispute management, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, negative criticism, tears, weeping

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IS IT WISE TO BE ASSERTIVE?

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date March 23, 2014
7 Comments on IS IT WISE TO BE ASSERTIVE?

When I first started to teach a graduate course at the University of Minnesota on conflict resolution, from time to time a student would ask me to compare what I was teaching to assertiveness training.

“From what I know about assertiveness training,” I explained, “it teaches a very narrow skill that can be helpful at times, particularly for very shy people. But it doesn’t adequately explain that for different situations alternatives to assertiveness may be the wiser course of action. The DIG Conflict Model that I am teaching provides students a toolbox with several tools that they can choose from. Depending on the situation, one tool can be better than another to increase personal power and wisely resolve conflicts.

“For example, when I was twelve years old, I was playing some basketball in a Brooklyn playground during summer vacation. After the first game, I was very thirsty and I thought about getting a drink at the fountain on the far end of the playground. But while I was playing, I had noticed a couple of bullies over by the fountain giving a hard time to kids smaller than they were. The bullies were clearly bigger than I was.

“Assertiveness trainers, it seems to me, would have me go over to the fountain. If the bullies got in my way, I should just stand up to them, asserting that I want to get a drink.

“Although that is certainly one option that I could have chosen, it risked having the cookies pounded out of me or they might just block my way from getting a drink pushing and shoving me away, I first considered other options. Perhaps I could come up with an approach that would achieve my goal of getting a drink in a less risky manner (see post titled The ABCs OF Power: The Letter B). It quickly occurred to me that my apartment is just a block and a half away. In those days I could run like the wind. So, in two minutes I was back home safely drinking all the water that I wanted. I then filled up a 36-ounce bottle with water and took it with me to the playground so I ended up having plenty of water after the next few games.

“The next day that I played at the playground, I noticed that the bullies were gone. When I went to get a drink at the fountain, I asked some of the kids who were playing there what happened to the bullies. A couple of them told me how they had gotten their big brothers to tell the bullies to cut their crap out. In terms of the DIG Conflict Model, they used the power of creating a coalition (see post titled “The ABCs of Power: The Letter C“) with their big brothers to achieve their goal and it worked. For the rest of the summer we all got our drinks at the fountain without any more conflicts. And so, here is an example in which I believe I teach some skills beyond assertiveness. A conflict was resolved in a satisfactory manner with less danger or hassle than assertiveness.

“Let’s look at another example of how the DIG Conflict Model’s approach differs from assertiveness training. If you are at a movie theater and you want to buy some candy, as long as you manage to go up to the candy counter and purchase what you want, you have pretty much fulfilled all the requirements of being assertive. But when I was a teenager, I worked at a candy counter. I found that some of my customers treated me in a way that was distinctly more pleasant than others who used a cold, impersonal style. As I thought about this, I noticed that the pleasant customers, when it was their turn on line, took a brief moment to look me in the eye and give me a respectful nod of the head. Rather than using a demanding voice that ordered me to get what they wanted, they said in a pleasant voice, ‘Can I have some…’ or ‘I would like some…’ After I got them what they wanted, they again looked me in the eye while thanking me.

“Both styles—the cold impersonal demanding style and the more pleasant respectful style—took the same amount of time and both approaches led to customers always getting the items that they wanted. Nevertheless, the DIG Conflict Model advocates that when we choose an approach to achieve what we want, we consider the golden rule—‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ Since I preferred the more pleasant respectful style when I was serving others behind a candy counter, I began to use a similar approach whenever I went up to a candy counter as a customer. I don’t think assertiveness training encourages people to think in this way.”

The first few times that I responded to the question that asked me to compare what I was teaching to assertiveness training, the questioners seemed satisfied with my answer, and I then went on with the rest of my lesson. But one day, a woman replied to my answer by voicing an objection. “I have taken an assertiveness training class,” she said, “and your description of assertiveness training doesn’t match my experience at all. For example, my instructor advocated being respectful while being assertive.”

Now, I could have asserted over and over again that I was right and she was wrong until she either stopped disagreeing with me or sat down and remained quiet, but I responded quite differently. First, I summarized what I heard her say. After she indicated that she was satisfied that I understood her position, I paused to think about it for a few moments. I then replied, as follows:

“My views about assertiveness training are based, admittedly, on very little experience. I have never actually taken an assertiveness class and learned about it from a couple of professors who both discussed the approach very briefly, maybe in five or ten minutes. One of the professors, for an assignment, had the class read a chapter in a book about the topic and when we met for class afterwards, we discussed what we had read for a few minutes. Therefore, I think it does makes sense that I learn some more about assertiveness so I can give a fairer reply to these types of questions. Thanks for raising this concern.”

The questioner seemed satisfied with my reply, and afterwards, I did take the time to look more carefully at the assertiveness approach. Here’s some of what I found out.

According to a Wikipedia article:

“Assertiveness is the quality of being self-assured and confident without being aggressive…. Dorland’s Medical Dictionary defines assertiveness as: “a form of behavior characterized by a confident declaration or affirmation of a statement without need of proof; this affirms the person’s rights or point of view without either aggressively threatening the rights of another (assuming a position of dominance) or submissively permitting another to ignore or deny one’s rights or point of view”.^[1]”

Wikipedia’s section on assertiveness training states:

“The goals of assertiveness training include:^[4]

increased awareness of personal rights
differentiation between non-assertiveness and assertiveness
differentiation between passive–aggressiveness and aggressiveness
learning both verbal and non-verbal assertiveness skills.

As a communication style and strategy, assertiveness is thus distinguished from both aggression and passivity. How people deal with personal boundaries, their own and those of other people, helps to distinguish between these three concepts. Passive communicators do not defend their own personal boundaries and thus allow aggressive people to abuse or manipulate them through fear. Passive communicators are also typically not likely to risk trying to influence anyone else. Aggressive people do not respect the personal boundaries of others and thus are liable to harm others while trying to influence them. A person communicates assertively by overcoming fear of speaking his or her mind or trying to influence others, but doing so in a way that respects the personal boundaries of others. Assertive people are also willing to defend themselves against aggressive people.”

This article also has a section titled “Communication.” Among the descriptions that are provided is, “Assertive communication involves respect for the boundaries of oneself and others. It also presumes an interest in the fulfillment of needs and wants through cooperation.^[5]”

When I began to flip through a few of the many books on assertiveness, I found that there were numerous approaches offered under this umbrella. Some like, Too Nice for Your Own Good: How to Stop Making 9 Self-Sabotaging Mistakes by Duke Robinson, seem to approach the topic from a no-nonsense position. Others, like The Guide to Compassionate Assertiveness: How to Express Your Needs and Deal with Conflict While Keeping a Kind Heart, by Sherrie Mansfield Vavrichek, appear to teach techniques that take into account a genuine concern for all involved parties.

And so, in the end, I came to realize that my original description that contrasted my approach with assertiveness was far too simplistic. And when answering the question, Is it wise to be assertive? my answer is, “Often there are some helpful ideas that fall under that umbrella. It is hard to be clear about this because there are simply way too many approaches that are referred to as assertiveness training to give a more definitive answer.

On this blog you will learn many ways to resolve a conflict. None violate principles taught in assertiveness training. Beyond the skills typically taught under the assertiveness banner there are discussions of skills that don’t violate assertiveness ideas, but can powerfully achieve your goals.

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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.

Tags assertiveness, assertiveness training, bullies, bully, bullying, conflict, conflict management, conflict resolution, Dilbert comics, dispute management, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, psychological maturity, the golden rule, wisdom

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READING ABOUT EMOTIONAL MATURITY IS OFTEN NOT ENOUGH

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date March 17, 2014
No Comments on READING ABOUT EMOTIONAL MATURITY IS OFTEN NOT ENOUGH

When you first learned to ride a bicycle, it probably helped that someone told you some basic ideas. Perhaps your big brother explained to you that when you want to go forward on a bike, you must push down with your foot on the pedal that is highest. When you do that you will see the other pedal start to rise up. When the other pedal comes all the way up, you have to push that one down with your other foot.

This type of verbal description can be very helpful, but no amount of it will get anyone to be a smooth bicycle rider. For that, people have to get up on the bike and try to coordinate all that they have heard, fall down, get back up on the bike, and try again and again, until they learn by doing.

Learning skills that lead to emotional maturity is similar in many ways. To learn them, you have to apply what you have heard or read by doing it, make mistakes, and try again and again until you get smooth at coordinating the skills. In today’s post, I offer a suggestion for practicing the skills taught on this blog that won’t cost you a red cent.

A Suggestion for Skill Practice

Go to your calendar and for each week over the next month, draw a circle on a day that you can spare five minutes. Next to the circle, write “CONFLICT?” This message is designed to remind you that on each of the circled dates you are to take five minutes to write down on a sheet of paper the most difficult conflict that you had or are currently having during the week. Keep this paper on your refrigerator door. You will see it there each time you reach for some food. This will help to remind you to check your calendar and to follow through with this plan.

When you write out your description of the conflict, use two sentences to describe the conflict from your perspective and two sentences from how you think the other party views or viewed the conflict. Remember to use the DIG Conflict Model for doing this.

In addition to these weekly calendar reminders, also draw a double circle on your calendar on a day that falls close to a month after you start this plan. Pick a day for the double circle day that you can spare a half hour to do the following: Take down from your refrigerator your list of the different conflicts that you described each week. Go to the first post of this blog and then begin to flip through the next 5 blog posts one by one by pressing the link below each post that takes you to the next post in the series. You’ll find these next post links toward the bottom right of each post just before the comments section. They appear as arrows pointing toward the right. As you skim through each of these posts, think about how they might apply to any of your recent experiences and take note of some ideas that have begun to fade from your memory.

Read over a few of the comics. This will refresh your memory of some of the ideas that are connected to how the comic was used in the post. It will also help you to keep your sense of humor as you wrestle with your conflict problems.

When you come upon posts that are specifically related to the various conflicts you described over the course of the month, thoroughly reread them. If you have resolved any of the conflicts, write out the resolution and comment how well the resolution worked out.

As you do this, from time to time you will come up with some ideas about how you can better handle a similar conflict if it should come up in the future. Write these ideas out. Then, close your eyes and imagine you are carrying out these ideas. Rehearse what you would say in your mind, how you would say it, and how you would reply depending on three or four possible reactions from the other party in the conflict.

Once you can smoothly carry out your imaginary rehearsal, do it three more times. It helps to practice a little beyond just being smooth because this will help you to carry them out if the situation becomes emotionally charged.

After the first month of carrying out this plan, do it again each month over the course of a full year and you will find that you now can almost instantly describe conflicts using the DIG Conflict Model. Moreover, you will have been practicing for a full year how to apply the conflict resolution skills taught on this blog to the types of conflicts you tend to face in your own life.

To help you to follow through with this skill enhancement strategy, let someone who is particularly reliable know about this plan. Have that person ask you once a week if you have followed through with this plan. During these reminders, spend a few minutes to discuss with this reliable person what you have been learning.

Such help should not go without a reward. Let the person who is to be giving you the reminder know that if you manage to complete a whole year of this exercise, you will treat him or her to dinner at a fine restaurant. If you are too young to take someone out for dinner, then see if your parents will be your reminder. Parents can often be persuaded to help their sons and daughters just out of pure love.

A fun way to supplement this strategy is to read the Cool Steve Trilogy, a coming of age series of three novels that take you on exciting adventures of a boy and his friends seeking to learn the secrets of becoming respected (see HERE). There you will find endearing characters that face many of the challenges that we all do. How they grapple with them will deepen your own understanding of how to handle similar challenges when you come face to face with them.

Conflict resolution training programs have not advanced so far as to eliminate the need for problem solving every now and then. Nor has there been an intervention created that will keep anger from rearing its mischievous head from time to time. In order to prepare for such events, I encourage you to view lapses in your skills not as a sign of helplessness, but as a sign to get yourself as quickly and safely as you can to the region of challenge. Once there, wisely use the relative period of peace and calm.

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Tags conflict management, conflict resolution, conflict resolution skills, DIG Conflict Model, emotional maturity, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, psychological maturity, wisdom

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LEARNING TO HANDLE CRITICISM MATURELY: A PRACTICE SESSION UTILIZING COMIC STRIP EXAMPLES

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date January 26, 2014
2 Comments on LEARNING TO HANDLE CRITICISM MATURELY: A PRACTICE SESSION UTILIZING COMIC STRIP EXAMPLES

In an earlier post, eight reasons were given for why someone might criticize or insult you. Becoming familiar with the various reasons is helpful because once you identify the reason, it becomes easier to choose a plan to maturely deal with the criticism. If you see that someone is just playfully teasing you, just a smile may be all that is needed as a response. If someone is criticizing you because he or she is in a bad mood, all that might be needed is a gentle, sympathetic response such as, “Is everything okay?”

One of the most frequent reasons why people might criticize you is to encourage you to make some type of improvement. For example, let’s say we’re going out to dinner at a fancy restaurant. I see that you have a stain on your shirt. I might say, “Your shirt has a stain on it.” In this example, I criticized your shirt because I want to encourage you to change your shirt for something that I think would be an improvement.

When we discussed handling this type of criticism, I proposed that there were:

Five levels of maturity for responding to this type of criticism (see posts titled RESPONDING TO CRITICISM: FOUR LEVELS OF MATURITY and RESPONDING TO CRITICISM: THE MOST MATURE LEVEL).

and

Five levels of maturity for providing this type of criticism (see post titled PROVIDING NEGATIVE CRITICISM: FIVE LEVELS OF MATURITY).

Today we will have some fun practicing identifying what level of maturity is being displayed by a comic strip character and then describing what the character would have to do to earn a more mature rating. By diligently working on the following exercises, you will find that you will be far better at applying these skills to real life situations.

Exercises with Comics

These exercises require that you read a comic and then respond to one or more questions. After you create each of your answers, you will have the opportunity to compare it to how I would go about analyzing the situation.

Here’s an interesting one. Linus criticizes his sister, Lucy, in the hope that this will encourage her to make an improvement. How would you rate Lucy’s response to Linus’s criticism?

MY ANSWER:Of the FIVE LEVELS OF MATURITY FOR RESPONDING TO CRITICISM, the lowest level is described as follows:

1. This level requires displaying one or more of the following:

Weeps or sobs with tears or pouts
Physically attacks the criticizer
Damages property

Because Lucy hits Linus, she deserves a rating of 1, the lowest level of maturity.

It is interesting that after she hits Linus, Lucy does begin to ask for more information about the criticism he had provided. This is encouraging from a developmental point of view. It suggests that Lucy is at least trying to come to some understanding about the criticism. Mature individuals do process the criticism they receive rather than just ignore it. But once Lucy has shown Linus that she is likely to slug him when he provides her criticism, he is unlikely to be willing to provide her even more criticism out of fear he would get slugged again. And so, even though Lucy is interested in learning more about this “talking too much” issue, she may not get a fair and accurate report. The fact that we silence people from providing important information to us when we hit them is one of the reasons hitting leads to a very low rating. Wise people encourage criticism rather that discourage it.

Although Lucy’s interest in the criticism does suggest that maturity is beginning to blossom within her, the rating system calls for a rating of 1 if she hits someone regardless of what else she does. However, if you would like to give her a little higher rating because she shows some real interest in the criticism, that’s fine with me.

In the next comic, Charlie Brown is provided two types of criticism, first positive and then negative. How would you rate each of Charlie’s two responses?

My Answer: As Patty is telling Charlie what’s on her mind, he seems to be smiling, and then he says, “Well, thank you, Patty…I appreciate the compliment.” This seems to be very consistent with a level 4 response.

Patty then replies, “Don’t mention it…I think that’s the least a person can say about you…” Charlie appears to be offended by this. There is a hint of a lowered eyebrow in the final picture (Mr. Shultz often used a lowered eyebrow to convey anger). Also, Charlie’s mouth is wide open, and the word, “LEAST” is in bold letters, followed by an exclamation mark. I’m going to give Charlie’s second response a 3 because it matches the level 3 description, which states:

3. This level requires displaying one or both of the following:

Displays defensiveness without directly insulting the criticizer (raising voice’s volume or pitch)
Displays a lack of interest either by verbally indicating this, or with nonverbal cues, or complete silence.

I think Charlie’s response matches level 3 because he made it pretty clear to Patty, without hitting her or calling her any names, that he has become defensive as a result of her second criticism. If Charlie had said the same words, but with a twinkle in his eyes, followed by a friendly smile, I would have given his response pretty close to a level 4.

Let’s do a Calvin and Hobbes comic; they’re so much fun. As you read it, please take a look to see how Susie handles Calvin’s criticism and then give her response your rating.

My Answer: After Calvin criticizes Susie’s statement about Hobbes looking cuddly by saying, “HA!”she does not cry, hit Calvin, destroy any property, insult or glare at him, nor does she indicate that she is uninterested in his criticism, so she doesn’t deserve to get a 1, 2, or 3 rating for her response. She begins by saying, “Ferocious?” This indicates to me that she has heard at least a part of the criticism and is giving it some thought. Summarizing the criticism is one way to show that whatever was said by the criticizer has been heard, and this is an important part of a level 4 response (“…the person criticized makes it clear that he or she fully understands what was said.”).

Later in her response, Susie indicates that she disagrees with Calvin’s criticism by saying, “No, he’s not. He’s a big cutie.” Then she hugs Hobbes and smiles sweetly.

Level 4 responses permit people to disagree, but it must be done without being disagreeable. I’m not sure if Calvin completely sees Susie’s style of disagreeing with him as not being disagreeable, but it strikes me as rather sweet.

In the last scene, Calvin and Hobbes argue and Hobbes says, “I was beguiled by her feminine charms, yow.” Because we, the readers, know Hobbes is really a stuffed animal, the words of Hobbes really are designed to capture a little of how Calvin feels inside. Thus Calvin recognizes at some level that Susie’s responses in the interaction he had with her were somewhat beguiling. I guess I’m leaning toward giving Susie a rating pretty close to a level 4. She could have been a little warmer to Calvin and showed some empathy for his desire to have a stuffed tiger that looks ferocious, so I’ll remove some fraction of one off her level 4 rating and give her a 3.8. If Susie was a student of mine, I’d provide her rating in the following format—“I gave you 4 points because your plan best matches the level 4 description, and then I subtracted .2 points because you didn’t show you fully understood Calvin’s criticism. Therefore you earned a 3.8.”

In the following Baby Blues comic the wife is angry about something.

It looks pretty obvious to me that the wife is angry because her husband is relaxing while she is doing one chore after another. Pretend that you are her and you decide to criticize your husband. This leads you to pause to consider how you are inclined to do this. You see within yourself that you plan to act nasty to him. Please rate that plan and then see if you can come up with something more mature.

My Answer: If I was imagining I was the wife in this situation, I would rate the plan that is used in the comic a 2 because it best matches the level 2 description:

This level requires displaying one or both of the following:

The criticizer does not explain what the offending behavior is, but instead expresses displeasure with glares, insults, shouting, silence, or threats that do not involve bodily harm
Threatens bodily harm regardless of what else is said

In seeking to figure out a more mature response, I think I might end up creating something like this— I’d say to my husband, “When I’m cleaning around the house and you are relaxing, I prefer that you get up and get your own drink. Are you okay with that?” Then I would listen to his response in a caring manner, show him that I heard what he said, and then, if I wanted to provide some additional negative criticism to him because I disagreed with his response, I would pause to rate the response I am inclined to make, and try to create something more mature.

Well, this concludes our little practice session for today. I hope you had some fun.

———————————-

Tags Calvin and Hobbes, Charlie Brown, conflict management, conflict resolution, criticism, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, insults, maturity, negative criticism, types of criticism

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PUTTING DOWN NON-GROUP MEMBERS

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date January 20, 2014
4 Comments on PUTTING DOWN NON-GROUP MEMBERS

On this blog, I have often discussed various reasons why someone might throw insults at you, and, depending on the reason, how to maturely deal with these challenging experiences (see for example, “Insults: A Comic Strip Guide“). If John is throwing an insult at you because he is in a bad mood, just asking in a concern manner, “Is everything OK, John, you sound like something is bothering you?” might be a useful way to begin to respectfully deal with this type of situation. You might want to respond differently, however, if you see that John is insulting you because he hopes it will encourage you to make a change he thinks you need to make. In this type of situation, beginning your response by initially ignoring the insult and instead summarizing his concern could be more helpful than asking if everything is OK or making a big thing about the insult.

In earlier posts, we have discussed eight different reasons why people throw insults at others, and mature responses to deal with each of these situations. Today let’s focus on some ways to deal with situations in which you might find yourself being insulted by those in a group because they view you as a non-group member.

Putting Down Non-group Members

Many people have a desire to join together in a common cause. This can dramatically increase their own personal power. And it is one of the big reasons why playing a game like baseball can be so much fun. Hit a homer or even a ground ball that brings in the winning run, and your group is patting you on the back and cheering.

When immature people join together, however, because of their lack of empathy, they often join together to put down and humiliate non-group members–particularly if the non-group members are a minority or viewed as too powerless to defend themselves.

Sometimes we see this sort of behavior occur when a new girl starts a new school.

When someone faces these types of difficult situations, what is a respectable way to respond? No single blog post can fully answer this question, but I would like to throw out some ideas for your consideration. Let’s begin with a parable.

The Parable of Jason and Ron

As you look at the four pictures of this parable, let me add some details. When Jason says, “I’m sorry you feel that way, Ron,” he looks squarely into Ron’s eyes. Then he gives Ron a slight nod of his head and goes on his way. Throughout the interaction between Jason and Ron, Jason remains friendly, while at the same time, self-assured.

When I was in school, one day I noticed a boy handle a similar situation like Jason. The other students seemed to respect how the boy handled the teasing. So I began to rehearse this style in front of a mirror over the course of a few days. The next time one of the older students teased me, I gave it a try. It ended up working just fine.

The “Give The Teasers What They Want” Approach

Now I understand that the approach described in “The Jason and Ron Parable” might not work perfectly in every situation. Acting self-assured might actually increase the desire by group members to prove that they are powerful and the person being insulted is nothing but a pile of trash. To try to prove this, they might insult you even worse than if you said nothing, or they might even physically attack you. Because of this risk, many people faced with insults from a larger, more powerful group choose to give the teasers what they want–to feel they are more powerful than others. People using this approach, when faced by these teasers, keep their eyes down toward the ground, and try to walk away as quickly as they can without saying anything. In this way, they don’t challenge the teasers sense of power in any way.

I’ve seen people use the “Give the Teasers What They Want” approach and it sometimes works to a certain degree. The immature group members, with their lack of empathy toward others, after saying a few mean things, let the teased person walk by, and there is no more of these incidences. The group members feel that they had a little fun and the teased person gets away without any physical harm. His or her feelings might feel hurt, but this passes before too long.

I must admit that I used this approach a few times when I was young. It bothered me that I didn’t stand up for myself in a more “manly” manner, but at the same time I was glad that I got home safe.

The “Physical Attack” Approach

Now in contrast to the approach used in the “Jason and Ron Parable” and the “Give The Teasers What They Want” approach, some people have made the case that if anyone insults you, the only proper way to deal with this is to start swinging with everything you got. It doesn’t matter if you end up getting ganged up, beaten severely, or evenbeing killed, you must physically attack to maintain your dignity. Consider Mike’s story.

Mike’s Story

One day, I received a comment on my blog by a young man who recalled an incident that he had had when he was a new kid at school. “On the school bus,” he wrote, “I began to get picked on. I was not the kind of mature kid who ignored the situation and so I ended up getting into fights as a result. I’d like to preface my next statement with the following–I am not condoning fighting and do not recommend fighting as a solution to any type of verbal altercation. That being said, after showing the bullies that I’d stand up for myself, not only did the bullying come to an abrupt end, but I ended up becoming friends with several of them and seemed to garner the respect of many of the other kids on the bus. Again I’m not condoning fighting but am suggesting that in some cases a show of strength can be an effective way to resolve conflict.”

Here’s how I responded to Mike:

Hi Mike,

You are absolutely right. In some situations a kid who starts to get picked on will physically go at those doing the tormenting. The tormentors end up backing down, others end up respecting the kid who shut the tormentors up, and the kid even ends up making friends with the tormentors. This is a real possibility. Now, let’s consider other possibilities of a kid physically going at his tormentors so all of us can make an informed decision about how best to handle these types of situations.

In one case that I’m familiar with, a boy that we will call Cal, went to his dad and complained in a choked up voice of a bully picking on him on the bus. The dad, having had a very similar experience when he was young that you had, Mike, began to holler at his son. “If someone picks on you, you go at him with everything you have and that will shut him up. That’s how I handled that type of situation and it worked every time. I can’t believe you didn’t do that. Here you are crying over it. I’m ashamed of you!”

What the dad didn’t know at the time was that Cal had already witnessed another kid on the bus who was bigger and stronger than him try to do just what his dad had said to do. The bully quickly grabbed the arm of this kid, twisted it behind his back until it was excruciatingly painful. After the kid tried his best to get free, the twisted arm was twisted tighter and the kid let out a scream. The bus driver yelled to quiet down. The bully then loosened his grip on the kid, slapped him on the side of his face, and said, “If you ever start in with me again, I’ll catch you after school and you’ll really be sorry.”

Cal, seeing this happen to someone he knew was stronger than he is, became increasing depressed and when he began to talk about killing himself, he ended up in my office. Before long he blurted out all that he was going through.

Now, here’s another possible outcome of a kid going physically at bullies. The kid ends up winning the fight, or at least does enough harm to the bullies, that they settle down for the remainder of the trip. But the bullies belong to a gang, and having embarrassed the bullies on the bus, the gang decides to get revenge. The kid gets attacked and ends up with serious injuries, or even dead.

Or the bullies, seeing that they can’t get the kid to kowtow to them, end up working up their fury until they begin to get revenge by doing some things behind the kid’s back. The kid discovers his backpack has been slashed and in the crowd that is looking on, he sees the bullies smirking. Then the kid’s bike is stolen. Again the bullies have smirks on their faces. The kid tries to get even, the conflict escalates, and before long someone gets knifed or a gun explodes.

These are just some of the other outcomes that have occurred when someone has decided to physically attack bullies. Each person has to consider the situation and decide what is right.

Since writing the above reply to Mike, I read Malcolm Gladwell’s bestselling book, Outliers. In one of his chapters, I learned that communities that have a higher than average percentage of people who hold the attitude that the only way to deal with people being disrespectful to you is to physically attack them tend to have higher than average murder rates. Is that the type of community you wish to live in. Some of the bullets that fly by in those communities end up striking people who are not even involved in the anger arousing situation, including children. And so, I think people should think seriously about this issue.

Making a choice between which type of approach to use in any given situation requires some deep thought. I hope this post gives you some useful material as you go about deciding for yourself what makes the best sense.

——————–
Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.

Tags anger, bullied, bullies, bully, bullying, conflict management, conflict resolution, criticism, dispute management, disrespectful, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, insults, maturity, non-group members, out groups, psychological maturity, types of criticism, wisdom

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DEALING WITH SUBTLE FORMS OF CRITICISM

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date December 22, 2013
7 Comments on DEALING WITH SUBTLE FORMS OF CRITICISM

If you have been following this blog, you know that from time to time I have been discussing insults and criticism. In earlier posts, we looked at situations in which people end up feeling insulted because someone provided negative criticism.

I have argued that rather than to feel insulted, it is possible to learn to welcome criticism, as well as words that might come off as insulting. When we learn to respond skillfully to negative criticism and insults, we develop a confidence in these types of situations. This dramatically reduces our defensiveness.

An important step toward mastering this skill is to learn to clearly recognize when criticism is occurring. If you can’t identify when a red light is flashing, you won’t be able to know when to apply the brakes on the car, and you are likely to end up in a serious accident.

Illustration by Lois Hubertz

Similarly, if you can’t identify when criticism is occurring, you won’t be able to know when to begin to put in place the plans that effectively deal with criticism.

Although some forms of criticism are as easy to recognize as a red light, some forms of criticism are far more subtle and therefore often go unrecognized as criticism. I therefore have presented posts that discuss dealing with direct and implied forms of criticism. I’ve noted that when someone makes a suggestion, this usually implies some negative criticism.

I also explained how recommending that someone get some additional education also usually implies some negative criticism.

We also took a good hard look at certain forms of levity, in which negative criticism is designed to be charmingly provocative. It seeks to get people to think more deeply about an issue. As George Bernard Shaw put it in his provocative book, Back to Methuselah:

“When a thing is funny, search it carefully for a hidden truth.”

Shaw, to ward off defensive reactions to his quips, often created fictional plays and had the characters in the plays say them. Great examples are:

“No man ever believes that the Bible means what it says: He is always convinced that it says what he means.“

“The difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how she’s treated.”

“Life isn’t about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.”

Today we will spend a little more time practicing enhancing our skills for recognizing subtle forms of criticism. This will help to improve our ability to know when to start using our dealing-with-criticism skills.

More Examples of Subtle Forms of Negative Criticism

As we move forward, please keep in mind that for the purposes of this blog, if someone evaluates something as negative the evaluator has made a negative criticism.

FIRST EXAMPLE

In the above Calvin and Hobbes scenario, Miss Wormwood politely asks Calvin to put his tiger, Hobbes, in his locker. Calvin objects to this request by crying out—“In my locker?! He’ll suffocate!”

Calvin’s response to Miss Wormwood’s request is an example of indirect negative criticism. He doesn’t directly state he has evaluated her request and found that there is something wrong with it, or that it is bad, or something of that sort. Nevertheless, he indicates that if he did what she asked, his tiger would suffocate. To recognize this as a form of negative criticism, it helps to notice that in addition to Calvin’s statement there are other indications that he thinks there is something wrong with Miss Wormwood’s request. The exclamation marks after Calvin’s statement, the drawing of Calvin with his mouth being wide open as if he is shouting, and the fact that he is practically flying out of his seat while he is shouting, all add up to indicate that Calvin’s reply is rightfully classified as a form of negative criticism of Miss Wormwood’s request.

Although Miss Wormwood takes Calvin’s negative criticism in stride, other teachers might become defensive, and yell something like, “Don’t you talk back to me, young man!” This might silence students, but leave them seething with anger that is expressed by a rejection of the school enterprise; or it might lead to shouting back at the teacher, creating an escalation of conflict that takes valuable learning time away from the class.

If Miss Wormwood would have become defensive and started to yell at Calvin in response to his negative criticism, this would, according the the DIG Conflict Model, be rated an immature level of responding (see Responding to Criticism: Four Levels of Maturity). Instead, she steers in the direction of Calvin’s criticism by offering the compromise of putting his “tiger” under his desk where it will be at least out of the way. This, according to the DIG Conflict Model, is one of the most mature responses (see Responding to Criticism: The Most Mature Level). We see, in this example, that Calvin quickly complies and his teacher can now go on with her lesson without any further delay.

SECOND EXAMPLE

Here’s a Sally Forth comic that illustrates that whenever there is a transaction involving a request or demand, we would be wise to anticipate negative criticism will be present as well.

In this comic, because Sally is visiting her mother for a few days, Ted is left on his own to deal with his nine-year-old daughter, Hil. When Ted tells Hil it’s time for bed, she begins to reject his demand. Is Hil’s rejection of the demand a form of criticism?

Well, consider her reply to her dad: “But Mom’s not here! We don’t need a bedtime!” Hil has negatively evaluated her dad’s demand by expressing her disagreement with it. If you tell someone you disagree with what he or she has done, you have negatively criticized the person’s act.

If Ted was skillful at first recognizing that Hil was providing him criticism, he would be in a better position to say to himself, “From what I’ve learned about the different levels of maturity, let me see if I can design a mature response.” What if he came up with something like this?

“Hil, I admire the way you seek to defend your freedom. I want to encourage that. And you know I’m crazy about you. At the same time, I also love your mom, as I know you do. It seems to me that we don’t want to break her rules behind her back. The bedtime schedule is designed for you to get enough rest so you will do well in school. Both of us have seen what happens to you when you don’t get enough rest. When your mom gets home, if you want to discuss the rules, we can do it with her, you and me all altogether. That would be the fair thing to do, wouldn’t it?”

These Examples are Designed to Encourage Deeper Thought

Above, I provided two examples of someone providing negative criticism. For each example, a response was described that I think is pretty mature. Please note, however, that I am NOT claiming that they are the ideal responses. Nor am I trying to make the case that the responses portrayed in the above examples are the only mature responses that can be made. There is a great deal of flexibility that we have for coming up with high level responses. I present the above examples in an effort to challenge you to think more deeply about what mature levels of responding look like according to your own lights.

Well, that’s my post for this week. To all of you who celebrate the beautiful Christmas season, I wish you good cheer, peace on Earth, and good will toward all of our fellow human beings!

With Warmest Regards,

Jeff

———————
Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.

Tags anger, challenge, conflict, conflict management, conflict resolution, criticism, dispute management, disrespectful, emotional intelligence, emotions, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, frustration, insults, negative criticism, parenting, threats, types of criticism

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THE ART OF PLAYFUL TEASING

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date December 19, 2013
5 Comments on THE ART OF PLAYFUL TEASING

Young group of men who are bullying one of them.

Teasing is a game sometimes known as bantering, joshing, crackin’, rankin’, playing the dozens, and trash talk. You are judged in part on the quality of your insults and also how well you keep your cool on being insulted.

Even the most mature people may like to play the teasing game, for they enjoy the duel of wits and the occasional humorous comeback.

MATURE VERSUS IMMATURE TEASING

Mature people are distinguished from immature people in this game by their lack of desire to hurt somebody in this game. Their empathy helps them to realize that the smiles and the lighthearted tone they try to set throughout the game sometimes mask real tensions. Thus, they keep their senses tuned to the subtleties of the repartee, and know when to back off when things begin to get too serious.

Less mature people, partly because of their lower levels of empathy, may think that the more awful they can make someone feel during this game, the better they are at it. When the criticizers have themselves been humiliated by other immature people, they may come to be even more motivated to humiliate others as a way to take out their own pain on others.

IS PLAYFUL TEASING REALLY WHAT IS GOING ON?

If you find that you are being criticized and it doesn’t seem to be motivated by a desire to get you to improve, and you’re not sure what else may be the reason, my advice is to first theorize that it’s just some playful teasing. If the criticism is provided with a smile, or by someone you know who likes to tease in a friendly way, you can be pretty sure that it is just for fun. Then, if you reply with a smile and a comment such as, “That’s a good one,” it shows that you can take a little teasing without getting defensive. If you want to take the game a little further, you can throw a friendly insult right back, like “Same to you, fellow.” When you’ve had enough of the game, smiling and giving the other player a pat on the back can be a good way to draw the game to an end.

Sometimes you are not sure if playful teasing is the name of the game. Then you have to be careful about throwing insults back at the insulter. If it turns out that the criticizer’s comments are not meant to be playful teasing, throwing back insults might make the situation worse. Here are some ideas that permit you to play along while providing you time to figure out what’s really going on.

After the first insult, consider responding in a kidding around way by crying, “OH YEAH!?” As you do this, pretend, in an obviously joking around way, that you have become defensive at the insulter’s comment. But then follow up your fake outrage with a broad smile. This shows that you can play along with the insult while, at the same time, you can take a joke.

If the insulter again insults you in a manner that still leaves you uncertain if the person is just teasing, consider saying the following. “It looks like you have some more missiles to send my way. Okay, hit me with your best shots. I already know that you think my nose is too big and my mother is a fool, so there’s no need to bother with those. Go ahead. I can take it.”

Then, if the insults continue, cry out, “Look out! Incoming torpedoes! Mayday! Mayday! I’m going down! I’m sinking! I’m sinking!” Then fall to your knees, and cover up your ears.

All of this allows you to continue to play along without throwing insults back at a criticizer who may not be playing the teasing game. By the time you fall to your knees, if you still aren’t clear about what is going on, get back up and try saying in a concerned, caring way, “Listen, at first I thought you were joking around. Now I’m not so sure. Is everything okay?”

This often leads to the insulter revealing what is actually motivating this behavior. But if the insulter walks away, and then begins to insult you on another occasion, it’s time to go down the list of other desires that motivate criticism (see HERE).

If you find that the person, or the group of people teasing you are playing the game of teasing in the immature manner—that is, just trying to make you feel as awful as possible—what can you do? I suggest that you just give a quick nod at the comment and then get as far away as possible. Then do your best to stay away from such people.

Now, I certainly realize it is not always easy to avoid a person or a group. Students or bus monitors who ride the school bus are pretty much forced to be confined with a certain set of students for a period of time a couple of times each day. Or the group you want to avoid might be in your classes. As you leave the class you might be stuck walking down the hall with the criticizers. In such cases, when you feel that you have reached your limit of dealing with the put downs, sometimes the following approach is worth a try.

To begin, this approach only requires that you learn to say two words—Please, enough. That’s the easy part. For some, learning how to say these words is the hard part of this strategy.

To use this technique, after two or three insults, say, in a very serious way, rather softly, but loud enough to be clearly heard, “Please.” Then pause for about three seconds while looking firmly into the eyes of each person who has been teasing you. Than say, “e” using the long “e” sound. Then, after another second, say, “nough!” When you look into the eyes of each of the name callers, you are NOT to glare at them in a threatening manner, with your eyebrows pressed to the middle of your forehead. Rather, you are seeking to be firm and very, very, serious.

If immediately after you finish saying this, somebody begins to insult you again, repeat the same words in a similar manner, but this time say it distinctly louder, though just short of shouting. At this point you are seeking to communicate that dire consequences are at hand. You must be firm and look squarely into the eyes of each insulter once again. Then you are to remain very serious while staring either out the school bus’s window or straight ahead where you are walking, but not at any one of the criticizers. You are to remain silent, without talking to anyone, for the remainder of the period you are stuck together, looking the whole time like you are through fooling around and enough is enough!

When the end of the time period that you are stuck together comes, immediately take your stuff and hurry away from the group continuing to look like you are very much annoyed.

The next time you see them, again, turn very serious and silent. If the group members don’t bother you, after a few minutes you can slowly begin to reduce the tension you have created. If the group members again insult you at any time, be silent and serious while again staring out the window or, if you are walking, straight ahead.

The game of immature name calling is kind of like a tennis game. In tennis, if someone hits the ball over the net to you and you refuse to hit it back, people will stop playing with you. Similarly, if someone insults you and you remain silent, often the insulter will find the game too boring to continue.

Although the style I want you to consider comes fairly easy to some, others must learn it with someone who can model the right tone and expression. Some people I worked with over the years found it hard not to put a smirk on their face after they said, “Please, enough!” Some came off as embarrassed while they carried out the technique. If you are not sure how you look while carrying out each step, observe yourself in a mirror. Also run through a role play with a couple of friends or family members and ask them if it looks right to them. Better yet, find out who directs plays at your school. Find out the director’s office hours, and go and explain what you want to learn.

I encourage you to avoid becoming discouraged if you end up botching the performance the first few times you try this during practice sessions. I’ve worked with students that at first kept cracking up throughout the process. Every one of them eventually learned to effectively utilize this technique. Five sessions, each lasting about fifteen minutes, can usually get a shy guy to put together an academy award winning performance.

There are times when those who are doing the teasing are being so cruel and relentless, that the wisest course of action is to inform authorities such as a school principal and the police. This may take courage, but keep in mind that if you remain silent, not only will you continue to be cruelly treated, but so too will others.

Tags anger, bullied, bullies, bully, bullying, conflict management, conflict resolution, criticism, dispute management, disrespectful, emotional intelligence, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, playful teasing, respect, threats, types of criticism

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GIVING SOMEONE THE COLD SHOULDER: WISE OR FOOLISH?

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date December 1, 2013
11 Comments on GIVING SOMEONE THE COLD SHOULDER: WISE OR FOOLISH?

Welcome to From Insults to Respect. Today we begin with a Blondie comic:

In the above scenario, as Dagwood gets into bed, rather than greet him with warm, open arms, Blondie has turned her back to him. Because she has become angry with him, all that Dagwood is going to get from Blondie on this night is Blondie’s cold shoulder.

What Does it Mean to Give Someone the Cold Shoulder?

When we are in a relationship, if someone does something that results in arousing our anger, we often seek to punish the person whom we believe to be the source of our anger. One way to do this is to act in a manner that is typically referred to as “giving him the cold shoulder.” Of course it is not just women who give guys the cold shoulder; guys do it to their spouse perhaps just as much as women.

Although when I think of someone giving the cold shoulder to someone, the image that typically comes to my mind is two people in a marriage relationship, but the fact is that a friend can do it to a friend as well.

According to Wikipedia, “the phrase “cold shoulder” has been used as a description of aloofness and disdain,^[1] a contemptuous look over one’s shoulder,^[4] and even in the context of a woman attempting to decline the advances of an aggressive man.^[6] Overall, it remains widely popular as a phrase for describing the act of ignoring someone or something, or giving an unfriendly response.^{[5] “}

Is the “Cold Shoulder” Technique Good or Bad?

I have had discussions with people who use this type of punishment and many of them are just fine with it. They report that whenever they use this approach, almost always, after awhile, the argument somehow gets worked out and their relationship, overall, has been wonderful. And they say that they know people who have had a valued relationship lasting a lifetime despite one or both parties in the relationship using the cold shoulder from time to time.

Although I agree that there are certainly worse ways to deal with disagreements than giving the person you are angry with the cold shoulder, nevertheless, I believe there is a much better alternative.

Notice that in the above comic when Dagwood becomes angry with Blondie, instead of giving her the cold shoulder, he lovingly says, “Please, Honey, I need a moment…”

Regular readers of this blog know that I have long advocated that when you see yourself becoming angry, it is wise to provide the other person in your relationship a time out signal that you have worked out when both of you were in a pleasant mood (see ANGER, STRESS AND THE SIGNALING TO BACK OFF TECHNIQUE). This postpones any deep problem solving until you give yourself some time to calm down.

In the Blondie comic that we just looked at, Dagwood’s signal is “Please, Honey, I need a moment…” Notice that he includes in his signal a sweet nickname for her. This can be very helpful. By learning to express your signal in a loving way, it decreases the likelihood that the problem will turn into a more heated problem that will be harder to solve in the future.

Also notice that Dagwood, in this example, says he needs a moment. Sometimes we need more than a moment. There is nothing wrong with taking even a week to calm down and to figure out how to best handle the problem you are experiencing. However, if you do think that it will take you more than 24 hours, I agree with the position that Thich Nhat Hanh takes in his beautiful book, Anger: Wisdom for Cooling the Flames. Before the 24 hours are up, do your best to tell the other person why you think you are angry in a loving manner if it is a family member, or a friendly manner with others. Hanh writes, “Try your best to say it peacefully. There may be some sadness in your voice, that’s fine. Just don’t say something to punish or to blame.”

At the beginning of this post I presented a comic in which Blondie makes it clear to Dagwood that she has no intention of telling him why she is angry. I think that keeping it a secret about why you are angry is simply not fair. And when you do something that strikes the other party as unfair, you now have created an extra reason to fuel the anger in the relationship.

If you agree with me that within 24 hours it is only fair to share in a loving or friendly way a little description of what you are experiencing, at the point that you provide your description there is no need to try to solve the problem. But Hanh and I both agree that you owe it to the person who is in a relationship with you to at least give him or her some explanation for what is going on within you. If you find that you don’t think you can say the words of this communication using a loving or friendly tone, at least try to write a brief note indicating a little of what you have been experiencing.

To help you to make the best use of the time that you are seeking to calm down and to problem solve, I hope you will read the two of the posts in which I discuss this process–Being a Wise Friend to Your Angry Self, Part 1 and Being a Wise Friend to Your Angry Self, Part 2.

Hanh aptly summarizes this process when he wrote:

When we are angry, we have to go back to ourselves and take good care of our anger. We cannot say, “Go away anger, you have to go away. I don’t want you.” When you have a stomachache, you don’t say, “I don’t want you, stomach, go away.” No, you take care of it. In the same way, we have to embrace and take good care of our anger. We recognize it as it is, embrace it, and smile…

Our practice is based on the insight of non-duality. Both our negative feelings and positive feelings are organic and belong to the same reality. So there is no need to fight; we only need to embrace and take care…. You may think that you have to combat evil and chase it out of your heart and mind. But this is wrong. The practice is to transform yourself. If you don’t have garbage, you have nothing to use in order to make compost. And if you don’t have compost, you have nothing to nourish the flower in you. You need the suffering, the affliction in you. Since they are organic, you know that you can transform them and make good use of them.

Well, that’s my post for today. I hope you find within it some food for thought. And please feel free to provide comments or ask questions by typing in the Leave a Reply box at the very bottom of this page.

Have a wonderful week!

Jeff

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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.

Tags anger, arguments, Blondie, cold shoulder, conflict, conflict management, conflict resolution, disagreement, dispute management, disrespectful, emotional intelligence, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, insults, negative criticism, psychological maturity, respect, silent treatment, wisdom

anger bullying child discipline conflict management conflict resolution criticism dig for the conflict emotional intelligence free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum insults interpersonal conflicts MATURITY Name calling respect stress taunting teasing wisdom

RESPONDING TO INSULTS BY IGNORING

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date November 24, 2013
5 Comments on RESPONDING TO INSULTS BY IGNORING

If you have been following this blog, you know that I have often discussed different ways to respond to insults.

For example, some people respond to negative criticism that is designed to be constructive as if it was an insult. They then become angry, defensive and end up storming away. In a post titled CRITICISM AND WISDOM, I encouraged people who respond in this way to this type of criticism to learn to change their attitude. I explained that this type of criticism does not have to be viewed as an insult, but rather, as something potentially helpful and something that can lead toward wisdom. Rather than becoming defensive, we can learn to welcome this type of criticism and even encourage the criticizer to feel free to provide additional criticism in the future. This takes practice, but it can be achieved.

Sometimes people begin to throw insults at you because they are angry about a conflict they have with you. In this type of situation, rather than to respond to the insults by becoming defensive and returning the insults, I advocated in an earlier post learning a plan to DIG FOR THE CONFLICT in a friendly, assertive manner.

More recently, I mentioned that in certain types of situations RESPONDING TO INSULTS WITH QUIET SADNESS can be helpful. This type of response is most helpful when the insults are being provided because the insulter is in a stressed-out mood about something that has nothing to do with you, or because the insulter is jealous of you.

When I engage in discussions about the above types of responses, people sometimes ask me what I think about just ignoring an insult.

In the above Luann comic strip, Delta tries to get Luann to consider ignoring Tiffany. I wonder if it would be better to ignore her insult but not ignore Tiffany.

This ignoring insults strategy has been with us for a long time. I remember a principal many years ago advocating that kids should learn to ignore insults because tossing insults at someone is a lot like a game of tennis. That is, in tennis, if Ron serves a ball to you, if you refuse to hit the ball back, Ron will quickly become bored and find someone else to play with. Similarly, if Ron throws an insult at you, if you ignore it, rather than throw the insult back, Ron will soon become bored and leave you alone.

There are times when I have used the ignoring approach fairly successfully. I remember a time when I was about 12-years old. I was passing three guys who were hanging out on a street corner. They appeared to be around 18. When they started insulting me, I ignored it and just kept walking. They let me pass with just one more insult. It was all over in a matter of seconds and no physical harm had occurred to me. And so, the ignoring strategy worked pretty well.

However, when I got home, my imagination took flight. I wondered if my sense of being a “true” man had gotten roughed up just a bit. Maybe, I thought, if I really had guts, I should have told those guys a thing or two even at the risk of being beaten to a bloody pulp. Then I imagined being Superman, and I used my super powers to beat all three of them up.

But now that I’m quite a bit older and I have a far more secure sense of my manhood, I think that under the circumstances that I found myself as a 12-year old, my actions were indeed reasonable. I’ve learned over the years that nothing I could have done differently would have been really likely to have had any real positive impact on those three guys.

To create real change with boys like that requires an intervention that a typical 12-year old could hardly be expected to create. It would have to involve, for example, someone the older boys genuinely respect, or creating a coalition of citizens working together to take the type of nonviolent actions that was used to put a stop to the disrespectful treatment of blacks during the civil rights demonstrations of the 1960s.

For young children and those individuals who have trouble learning words, the great benefit of the ignoring approach is that it is perhaps the easiest strategy to learn. Not even a single word is required, and it indeed can often produce better results then returning insults with insults.

Close cousins to the ignoring approach, is to learn to use a particular word or phrase in response to the first insult followed by ignoring any following insults. The most popular of course is “Sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never harm me.” Others are:

“So.”

“Good one.”

“Nice try.”

“I’m not going there.”

This “word or phrase approach” can give the person using it the experience of doing something to stick up for oneself. The word or phrase is meant to convey to the insulter that you recognize the game that the insulter is trying to play, and you are smart enough to know how to refuse to play it if that’s what you wish to do. There is a sense of empowerment that comes with being involved in a choice and taking some outward action to exercise your choice. Ignoring, or covering your ears to pretend to ignore, without saying anything may seem “weaker” to you than at least saying something on your behalf in a pleasant, self-assured manner.

This strategy works best when the word or phrase is uttered in a pleasant, friendly tone while looking squarely into the eyes of the insulter. If you instead say the word or phrase with a sneer or with any other action that tries to convey that you are somehow better or smarter than the insulter, the strategy is likely to make the situation worse. You don’t want to do anything that makes the insulter angrier than he or she may already be. That might lead to an escalation of any underlying conflict and violence. A sneer amounts to returning the insult, when that’s just what you want to avoid. Any action that comes off as returning the insult will most likely motivate the insulter to try harder to make you feel bad.

Now, although ignoring or using a quick word or phrase followed by ignoring is easy to learn and often much better than returning the insult, for most situations trying to first find out why the person is throwing out insults is a much better course of action (see INSULTS: A COMIC STRIP LOVER’S GUIDE). By asking the insulter in a concerned manner the reason for the insult can lead to a quick fix for some underlying problem. And of course, if this “asking in a concerned manner” approach doesn’t work, you can always use the ignoring approach or one of its cousins afterwards.

Well, that’s my post for this week. I’m hoping readers will take some time to post a comment about these ideas. What has worked for you? What has been your experience in trying any of these strategies? I’d love to hear from you.

Have a great week!

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Tags anger, conflict management, conflict resolution, criticism, dig for the conflict, dispute management, disrespectful, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, Ignoring, insulter, jr, Martin Luther King, psychological maturity, respect, violence, wisdom

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TOUCHING WHILE TRYING TO RESOLVE CONFLICTS: IS THERE A PLACE FOR IT?

Post author By Dr. Jeffrey Rubin
Post date October 20, 2013
12 Comments on TOUCHING WHILE TRYING TO RESOLVE CONFLICTS: IS THERE A PLACE FOR IT?

The chief executive officer (CEO) in the Dilbert comic strip is the bald-headed guy. He has been having quite a few conflicts with his workers. After trying some new approaches to resolve these conflicts, he decides to see if touching might help:

Apparently, one of the CEO’s workers likes the way it feels when he is patted on his head. I don’t think I would like my boss to pat me on my head. Nevertheless, I do wonder if touching someone in certain ways during a conflict may be helpful at times.

When I was growing up, my mother and some of my male acquaintances would use physical contact during a conflict with me in the form of hitting. They did this to try to force me to do whatever they wanted me to do. But in this post, I’m not going to discuss that type of physical contact.

I also received some forms of physical contact in a few non-conflict situations. Affectionate close relatives would hug me when saying hello. In my early days my friends and male cousins would roughhouse in a fun manner. These occurred without any real conflict. Today, I have something very different in mind.

One of the ways I recall someone touching me during a conflict occurred when I was sixteen years old. I was on the Lincoln High baseball team and I happened to show up a little late for practice.

Soon after I arrived, my coach took me off to the side so we could talk in semi-privacy. The other players could still see us, but they were far enough away so that what my coach had to say was just for my ears.

He first looked down at the ground for a long 30 seconds or so, and then he looked squarely into my eyes while putting his hand softly on the back of my shoulder. In a soft voice, he said, “Jeff, I see you as one of the leaders on this team. I’m hoping this is the last time you come late for practice. Do you understand me?”

“Yes, Coach,” I replied. “I’m real sorry about being late.”

He then patted me on my back and said, “OK, Jeff, now go take some fielding practice, and I want to see you hustling out there.”

“You bet, Coach!”

Now, at the time, it never even crossed my mind that my coach had done anything that anyone could possibly think of as wrong. When I was growing up, in sports touching occurred all the time. A coach might put his arm around you while he gave you some instructions.

If you made a nice play, the coach and your team mates might pat you on the arm or back, or even on your rear end.

And both male and female athletes and coaches would give each other enthusiastic hugs.

My baseball coach had done something a little different when he touched me. Usually touching in sports occurred during the rough and tumble of a game or as a sign that you did something good. My baseball coach had touched me, not for any of those two reasons, but because he was trying to work out a conflict he was having with me. And it worked. I never came late again, and not only did I not think he did anything wrong, I found that I had an increased amount of respect for him because of the way he handled the situation.

Soon after, I found myself reflecting upon what he did. He spoke to me in relative privacy. When he began, he looked down in a way that I could tell that what I did led to him feeling unhappy. And then, when he looked into my eyes and said that he felt that I was viewed as one of the team leaders, there was something about what he said and how he said it that led me to feel that he genuinely liked me. At the same time, he told me what he wanted me to do in the future in very clear terms–to be on time for practice.

After that incident, I found myself often using a similar approach, and I found it very helpful. As a result, I didn’t think there could be any problem with it. But as the years went on, from time to time I have heard individuals complain about someone touching them in similar situations and not liking it. And so, I began to ask some questions to see if I could come to understand the reasons for our experiences being so very different.

One teenager whom we will call Judy told me that a guy at school made a suggestion to her that made her very angry.

“Then what happened,” I asked.

“How did you feel about the way the guy handled the situation?” I asked.

“I didn’t like the way he touched me,” Judy replied. “He squeezed my shoulder and it felt threatening.”

“Hmmm,” I replied. “Something about the way he squeezed your shoulder felt uncomfortable. I see. What if he just touched you gently in the back of your shoulder while saying what he said? Would you have felt more comfortable with that?”

Judy thought about this for a few seconds and then looked up at me and smiled. “That would have been okay,” she replied. “There was something about the way he actually touched me that felt creepy, and I didn’t like it at all.”

Although Judy said that if the boy would have touched her gently on the back, she would have felt okay about that, I have heard some other folks say that they don’t like to be touched at all.

So what do we do about this? Do we stop touching everyone in these types of situations because some people feel uncomfortable with being touched? Do we begin to think about what kinds of touching might be okay, and what types of touching is not okay?

I really can’t answer this type of question for everyone. It would be very helpful if readers over the next few weeks share with us their thoughts about this, so we have more information to judge. In the meantime, I will say this. If you do try the touching approach with someone, I think you would be wise to watch carefully how the other person is reacting. If the person begins to appear tense, with a crinkling of the forehead, a stiffening of the body or by pulling away from the touch, I encourage you to back off and offer an apology. Perhaps saying something like this might be helpful, “I sense that you don’t like me to touch you. I’ll keep that in mind in the future and respect your feelings. I’m sorry I made you feel uncomfortable.” Then, a gentle smile might ease some of the tension.

Well, I hope this post gives you some ideas to think about, and, as always, I hope to be reading your comments real soon.

Have a great week,

Jeff

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Some people will enjoy reading this blog by beginning with the first post and then moving forward to the next more recent one; then to the next one; and so on. This permits readers to catch up on some ideas that were presented earlier and to move through all of the ideas in a systematic fashion to develop their emotional intelligence. To begin at the very first post you can click HERE.

Tags coach, conflict management, conflict resolution, free social intelligence and emotional intelligence curriculum, insults, psychological maturity, respect, touching, wisdom