Tag: challenge

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DOES ANGER DO US ANY GOOD?

Most of us know situations in which someone became angry and it made the situation worse.  For example, consider the following Luann comic.

anger luan1anger luan2anger luan3 In the comic, Toni, the girl with blond hair, becomes angry at Miss Eiffel because of the way she was treating her boyfriend, Brad.  In the end, Toni and the guy she cares about are far from happy.

Although expressing our anger can often make certain situations worse, we continue to get angry.  How come?

ANGER AS A RAPID, LIFE-SAVING RESPONSE TO THREATS

Over time, people who didn’t find ways to respond very fast to threats would end up getting killed.  anger bearAt times, this meant that if they saw a vicious animal rushing at them, the best thing they could do is to very quickly fight back either to scare off the attacker who would end up running away or to kill the attacker.

If people would have killed every time they felt a threat to one of their desires, they would end up killing the vast majority of the members in their group.  Because larger groups can defend themselves against attacks better than very small groups, perhaps communities that learned to cooperate provided the best opportunity for its members to survive.

According to this theory, when perceiving a threat people learned to warn others in their community by showing signs of anger.  Their anger became an indication that they were getting increasingly ready to attack and those in their community, when warned of this, attempted to find ways to reduce the threat without the requirement that someone had to be killed.

 Anger can Function to Encourage Help

Many years ago I did a research project when I was a university student.  After I collected the data, I had to enter it into a computer.

Up to this point in my psychology research experience, the first step to enter my data was to punch IBM computer cards.  But the supervisor of the computer room informed me that there had been some recent advances in computer technology and IBM cards were no longer used.  He told me what to do, and I diligently followed his instructions.

anger file3

After typing at the computer for three hours, I felt a static electricity shock and the video screen with my three hours of data input went blank.  My heart started beating hard.  I tapped the screen and wiggled the keyboard.  Nothing!

 anger file1

“What is going on here?!” I shouted in anger.

 anger file2

The guy sitting at the next computer immediately stopped what he was doing and called over the supervisor to help me.  “What’s the matter?” he asked.

After explaining to him that all of the data that I entered had disappeared, he asked if I had been pressing the SAVE button every few minutes to guard against data loss.

“You never told me anything about pressing SAVE when you gave me directions!” I angrily hollered.

“I’m sorry,” he replied.  “I really should have.”

Notice that when I started to get angry, I very quickly got someone to start helping me to figure out what was wrong.  I probably would have gotten the same help if I asked for assistance without shouting, but because angry responses do lead so often to people cooperating when someone does become angry, it encourages us to keep on getting angry.

Although I was angry, I was able to control myself enough and realized that it was not in my interest to either kill or physically harm the supervisor.  Getting arrested would have only wasted more time.  I also realized that I made mistakes from time to time.  Just like I wouldn’t want to be slugged every time I made a mistake, it didn’t seem right to slug this guy for making a mistake.

Of course, there may very well be times when we become angry that our heightened preparedness to engage in fighting can serve a life-saving function.  This was probably more likely to be the case in ancient tribal communities.

OTHER BENEFITS OF ANGER

So far, we discussed three benefits of anger. 1. to respond fast enough with fighting during times when that may be potentially lifesaving,  2. to scare away an attacker, and  3. to give off signals in the community that encourage others to help solve a conflict before any negative consequences from a fight occur.

In our culture there are other factors leading us to think that anger is highly effective for achieving our desires.

Anger 4In this Wizard of Id comic, Bung presents the theory that by making ourselves angry we can increase our strength.  Obviously, just the increase of strength without the skill to use it wisely can lead to some unexpected whacks.

Some coaches believe that by working up anger in the hearts of their players, the players will perform physically better even if the goal is not to kill or physically injure others.

anger 5

Even on tasks that don’t require mighty physical strength to succeed, many people have come to believe working up anger will challenge a person to work harder.

anger 6

ARE THE BENEFITS OF ANGER EXAGGERATED

Although anger can be more effective than some other poorly thought out strategies, often people are led to think it is more effective than it really is.  This is because the negative effects of anger may be hidden.

anger 7In the above comic, Lt. Fuzz expresses anger at Sarge because he is being noisy.  As a result, Sarge secretly becomes angry and desires to annoy Lt. Fuzz.  But Lt. Fuzz only sees Sarge replying to his anger by saying, “Yes Sir.”  And so, Lt. Fuzz comes away thinking Sarge has responded with respect.  He doesn’t see that Sarge actually covertly disrespects him and does things that make Lt. Fuzz’s life miserable.  Here we see a fine illustration of how easily we can be misled into thinking our angry responses work better than they actually do.

MOVING FROM ANGER TO CHALLENGE

Anger can be effective at times.  And often you may find yourself very tempted to let your anger go on an all out attack.  Nevertheless, you would be wise to pause and remind yourself that oftentimes such attacks lead to obvious and hidden problems.

anger challenge imagesChallenge allows you to accomplish all of what anger positively does without anger’s negative consequences.

In brief, challenge has us:

  • Working up a heightened sense of determination to achieve our desire
  • Meanwhile, we consider the twin beliefs that the stress we have been experiencing is normal and fulfillment is not found in easy comfort, security, and routine, but rather in the continual growth in wisdom through what is learned from negative and positive experiences of an active, changing life[1]
  • Then, we take a deep breath and resolve to get down to the task at hand—carrying out a two-step process.

Step 1.  Consider if the most obvious resolution is sufficient.  

In such cases in which you become convinced that the resolution that you came up with poses no serious risks, it makes sense to you, and you feel comfortable with it, the only job you have left is to carry out your plan with charm, courage, and determination.  However, if the most obvious solution does pose a serious risk, or you just don’t feel comfortable with it for any reason, it’s time to go to Step 2.

Step 2.  Carrying out a more complete decision process. 

anger challenge2 imagesThere are numerous benefits that occur when we learn how to transform anger into challenge.  Now I understand perfectly well that for most of us this is far easier said than done.  It is for this reason that in future posts I will be explaining more about what challenge is, discussing many of its benefits and how we can all learn, in a fun way, how to use challenge even in the most difficult of circumstances.

[1] The value of this attitude is discussed in: S. R. Maddi, D. M. Khoshaba, R. H. Harvey, M Fazel, & N Resurreccion, 2011, “The Personality Construct of Hardiness, V: Relationships with the Construction of Existential Meaning in Life,” Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 51(3), 369-388.

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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.

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CRITICIZING YOURSELF: FIVE LEVELS OF MATURITY

Earlier, I wrote a post titled “Providing Negative Criticism: Five Levels of Maturity.”  When I gave examples of people using the five levels, they typically involved someone providing criticism to someone else.  And yet, if you think about it, you probably criticize yourself at least as much as you criticize others.

Charlie13

So, it is time that we begin to take a good hard look to see if the five levels of maturity apply equally well when we think about providing negative criticism to ourselves? To do so, please take another look at the five levels that have now been rewritten so they can be used to rate the way you criticize yourself.. As you do, imagine a recent time that you criticized yourself and see which of the levels best matches your style of criticizing yourself.

PROVIDING NEGATIVE CRITICISM TO YOURSELF: FIVE LEVELS OF MATURITY

Below you will find preliminary descriptions of how people at five developmental levels of maturity provide negative criticism to themselves.  Level one is the most immature and uses observations of babies as its starting point.  Each successive level is more mature.     

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

  • Cries without stating what the crying is about.
  • Physically harms you,
  • Damages property.

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

  • You do not explain what the offending behavior is, but instead express displeasure with glares, insults, shouting, silence, or threats that do not involve bodily harm. 
  • Threatens bodily harm regardless of what else is said.     

    3.  You clearly state the criticism with enough detail so you can improve the behavior, idea, or appearance, but couple it with glares, insults, shouts, or threats that are not about bodily harm.         

    4.  You state the criticism without bodily attacks, damaging property, glares, insults, threats, or shouts, and with enough details so that you can improve the behavior, idea, or appearance.  

   5.  When you provide criticism, you do so in a manner very similar to a level four response, but beforehand, you consider the situation that you are in.  As a result of such considerations, you may decide to alter the criticism.

APPLYING THE FIVE LEVELS TO SELF-CRITICISM

One of the last times I criticized myself, I was playing golf, and when I swung at the ball, I missed it.

Golf insult 2

I found myself crying out, “Man, that was stupid!” As I saw myself doing this, I quickly realized that such a response was not very helpful.  I moved away from any more insults and just took a moment to experience the frustration within me.  After about five seconds of this, I then realized that I was with other golfers, and they had just seen me calling myself stupid.  I looked each of them in their eyes and smiled. Then, I reviewed in my mind what a perfect swing in that situation is suppose to look like.  Finally, I stepped into position and took another swing.

How Did I Do?

Well, at least I didn’t break my club slamming it to the ground, as I had done a few times when I first began to learn the game. A couple of times when I did slam the clubs down, I broke the club and had to go buy a new one–thus, it was a costly mistake.  If I had acted that way–that is, by breaking my club–I would have acted at level 2. It has been years since the last time I slammed a club down, a clear sign that I matured in this domain.

The way I acted the last time was a little more mature than a level two.

You might have noticed as I was describing my recent incident of self-criticism that my criticism and my response to the criticism seems to have merged together, and it is not easy to tell at what point “providing criticism” and “responding to criticism” is actually taking place.  Therefore, it is a good idea, as we think about these issues to spend some time reviewing the lesson I presented earlier about responding to criticism (see HERE).

As I recall what happened the last time I was out on the golf course, I’m going to say that I initially responded at level 3, but then quickly recovered and then responded at level 5.

Another Example

Our next example of self-criticism is from the comic strip of Calvin and Hobbes by the brilliant Bill Watterson.  Calvin’s stuffed tiger, Hobbes, is criticizing Calvin’s remark about his summer vacation coming to an end.  We understand, of course, that what Hobbes says to Calvin is, in actuality, what Calvin is saying to himself.  After Hobbes criticizes Calvin’s remark (“Oh come on, you spent half the summer complaining how bored you were.”) Calvin responds.  Please study his response, and then see if you can rate what level of maturity it is at.           

Calvin intrapersonal
My answer: Hobbes has criticized Calvin for exaggerating about how awful life will be now that summer vacation is over since he often complained of being bored.  “I did?” he responds.  It seems to me that Calvin is really asking this of himself.  He then curls his pointer finger and puts it on his lip.  This is a classic pose indicating deep thought.  While he is doing this, he says to himself, “How strange.  I must have been delirious from having so much fun.”  In the next scene, we see Calvin imagining the type of fun he had had over the summer.  It depicts Calvin and Hobbes watching TV with the sound blasting, eating Sugar Bombs, with Calvin’s eyes in a delirious, hypnotized stare.

I’m leaning toward giving Calvin a level 4 rating because he is showing me that he is giving some real thought to the criticism, and I like his apparent sense of humor as he imagines in an almost burlesque type of way his wasting all of his time over the summer.

Now, I understand that some might look at this image of Calvin wasting his summer in front of a TV and think he is mocking his choice of summer activities, thus insulting himself.  When people use humor while responding to criticism, it can be taken as an insult, or as a good-natured way to smooth over some rough parts of the processing that goes along with criticism.  Only Calvin, in this scenario, would be able to say if he felt it as an insult, or as something comical.

Let’s Try Another One

Here’s a young teenager who provides self-criticism at a pretty obvious level 2.

basketball player 1Here, the young lady kinda tells herself what her criticism is about–She recalls missing an important basketball shot and she declares that she let her team down.  But she doesn’t say how she can begin to improve the situation.  Instead, she begins to insult herself.

What if she had handled the situation a little differently:

basketball player 2Notice I blackened out what level I think this self-criticism is at.  That’s because I would like you to decide if this is a more mature level or not.

There’s Some Controversy About this Example

Some of my students argue that the example in which the girl insults herself should be given a higher rating then the second example.  Here’s their reason. If you insult yourself, they claim, it will more likely prod you into doing something constructive than if you ignore it.  Therefore it should be viewed as at least as high a level as the example in which the girl decides to take some time to calm down before deciding what next steps she might take.

Here are two quick explanations for why insulting yourself deserves a lower rating than the taking some time to calm down approach.  First, just because someone takes some time out to calm down doesn’t mean they will forget what happened. It is possible that their efforts to take some time to calm down will lead to calming down sooner than throwing insults at themselves, and within that calmness a more reasoned approach may come about.

Second, theoretically those people who get into the habit of insulting themselves when they criticize themselves are at an increased risk of insulting someone else who criticizes them.  This is oftentimes not a good thing because when people are insulted it increases the likelihood they will do something that is harmful to the insulter.  It is, therefore, a good idea to practice not insulting yourself when you criticize yourself because that practice will make it easier to avoid criticizing others when they criticize you.

Well, there’s your lesson for today.  It was designed to begin the process of thinking about the most mature way to criticize yourself.  I will have a lot more to say about this in future posts.

For those of you who seek to become masters at dealing with name calling, insults and teasing, here’s an important exercise to do over the next week.  Put aside three five-minute periods to do the following:

Think about the last time you criticized yourself.  Recall what led to the criticism and how you felt.  Spend a full minute just observing the feelings that come up as you recall the incident.  Then write down what you said to yourself as you provided the criticism.  Finally, write down what you think would have been a maturer way to handle that situation.

Thanks for visiting this week, and I hope you come back  soon.

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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.

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The ABCs of Power: The Letter “A”

peanuts power

Power, in one sense, is the ability to achieve your desires.  In another sense, it is the feeling you get when you have mastered a skill that increases the probability that some desire of yours will be fulfilled.  And in yet another sense, it is the feeling that you get when you come to believe that you have the ability to master any skill that will be necessary to achieve your desires as you go along your life path.  When people feel confident, they feel powerful.  When Lucy steps up on the mound in spring, perhaps she feels that she can take on anything and achieve greatness!

Power and its Connection with Name Calling, Insults and Teasing

Illustration by Deanna Martinez
Illustration by Deanna Martinez

The reason that people use name calling, insults and teasing is to try to achieve their desires. In my blog post titled “Insults: A Comic Strip Lover’s Guide,” I provide readers with eight typical desires that people seek to achieve by using name calling, insults and teasing.  One example that we covered is the desire to get someone to improve.  Consider a mother who sees her young boy misbehaving.  She desires to get him to improve, so she yells at him, “You little brat, stop that right now!”  If the plans that she uses typically achieve her desires, we say that she is a powerful person, or she has a great deal of power.  If the plans that she uses make it harder for her to achieve her desires, we picture her as weak and ineffective.  Readers of this blog have been learning plans to increase their skill when they are tempted to launch insults at others or when they find that someone is trying to insult them.  Learning the sources of power will greatly enhance these skills.

Power and Plans

People who are powerful at achieving their desires create effective plans.  They consider multiple options and how each option would impact the achieving of not only the most pressing desire, but their other desires. They consider not only the short term effects of the plan, but the longer term effects as well.

mother and child fightingA mother who brutally beats her son to get him to do as he is told may find that in the short term this plan works, but as the boy becomes older, counter to the mother’s long term desires, he rebels, turns violent towards her, and then runs away, never to be heard from again.  The mother comes to feel that what she thought was a powerful way to bring up children was her biggest mistake.

Power Plans versus Sources of Power

The term, “plan,” when used here refers to a series of steps that are described in enough detail so that any reasonable person can immediately implement them.  Because there are so many different types of situations in which you find your desires popping up, at times you will feel stuck in coming up with a plan.

A “source of power,” as used here, refers to an idea that can help you to come up with a plan even when you feel stuck.  Such sources of power, although not specific enough to implement without some creative problem solving, are helpful in fulfilling a wider range of desires than specific plans. Knowledge of the sources of power can turn a feeling of hopelessness into a feeling of challenge.

The “ABCs of Power” List

power guitaristpowerful girlIn the following weeks, we will begin to build a list of sources of power. They will be placed in alphabetical order, beginning with the letter “A.”  Once we are done, by keeping the list readily available whenever you feel stuck about how to achieve your desire, you will be able to retrieve the list, and as you go through it, you will find that it can often serve as an aid for creating a promising plan.  By spending time familiarizing yourself with the list, you will find that even when you don’t have the list at your fingertips its alphabetical arrangement will aid your recall.

Today, we will cover the first source of power on our list.

“A” is for Advancing Skills

Consider the following Peanuts comic:

Charlie Brown and the red haired girl

Here we see that Charlie Brown insults himself by stating “Rats!  Nobody is ever going to like me.”  When he says this, he has three related desires—not being lonely during each lunch hour, getting the little red-haired girl to come over and join him for lunch, and getting people to like him.

Charlie Brown, in this example, tries to come up with a plan to fulfill his desires but the only ones that come to him is to insult himself, and going over to the red-haired girl and trying to talk to her.  The first of these two plans doesn’t seem to be much help, and the other seems to Charlie Brown to be too likely to make a bad situation even worse. He seems to have fallen into a state of hopelessness.

But let’s pretend Charlie Brown has a list of the ABCs of Power.  The list doesn’t supply him instantly with a specific plan, but he can use it to help create a plan.  Today he looks at the first item on such a list, and sees it is Advancing Skills.  Next to the item is a little description of how it can be used.  Thus, it says:

“Advancing skills” as a source of power will refer here to working toward developing a talent that people you care about value.  For example, consider the following comic.

Dagwood woodworking

Dagwood seems to recognize that making something with his own hands for Blondie has the potential to fulfill his desire that his wife will appreciate him.  But we can see from Blondie’s reaction that his current skill level is far from what it will need to be before his desire will be fulfilled.

In contrast to Dagwood’s failed efforts, in the comic below Linus has figured out a way to fulfill his desire that his teacher appreciates his work.

Linus writing

It’s important to recognize that “advancing skill” as a source of power does not require that you have some inborn talent.  In most domains many characteristics once believed to reflect innate talent are actually the result of individuals’ prolonged efforts to improve performance. 

Dagwood’s efforts to create woodworks of art by going into his basement once a year and sloppily throwing something together for Blondie, is not what I’m referring to here.  The results of such efforts are unlikely to be truly appreciated.

Spending at least fifteen minutes a few times a week may enable you to develop a set of skills that can help to position yourself as being respected for that skill among the people you know. 

Charlie Brown and the red haired girlNow how might we apply “advancing skills,” as a source of power, to Charlie Brown’s problem?

Well, when I was about Charlie Brown’s age, my family moved in January and I had to start a new school in the middle of the year.  Everyone there had already formed into groups of friends and I felt lonely not only during the lunch period, but during much of the rest of my days as well.  One day, just so that I would have something to do during the lunch period, I brought three balls with me. I had been practicing the art of juggling for a weeks and had managed to reach a point at which I could get three balls going pretty good, but after a few seconds, I’d usually drop one.  I felt that with a little more practice, my performance might become smoother.

Very shortly after I began to practice during the lunch period, some kids came over and watched.  Before long they asked if they could give it a try. I obliged. A few began to bring some balls with them to school and during the lunch period we began to practice together. As we did, we began to talk about other things as well and I learned their names, and the place began to feel less lonely.

At the same time, I noticed that quite a few kids liked to play basketball in the schoolyard as soon as they finished their lunch. Up to that point, I hadn’t developed my basketball skills.

basketball shotRather than to dive right in and ask to play with the other kids during the lunch period, I began to practice after school at a nearby playground. And even before I was ready to get chosen into games, the fact that I felt I was heading in the right direction by working on a plan made these days far more tolerable than if I believed that I was doomed to be lonely for the rest of my life. It gave me a sense of power, in contrast to a sense of feeling powerless.

When I did venture into some basketball games during lunch, I found that because of the way sides were chosen, I didn’t have to be the best player on the court to be a valued contributor to the team. The players just wanted to be challenged enough so that they had to work to get a basket and to win a game.

acrobatscharlie brown as artist“Advancing skill” as a source of power can be used in many ways to achieve your desires. If juggling and basketball don’t interest you, maybe acrobatics, chess or something artistic will.

In addition to helping people who find themselves dealing with the kinds of problems Charlie Brown faces in our example, “Advancing Skills” can be enormously important in other settings. Millions of people in the workforce, for example, have had desires to improve their salaries or the type of work they do and found that advancing their skills led to their desires being fulfilled.  And whether you are in a school setting or in the workforce, if you have a desire to improve your interpersonal relationships or your intrapersonal relationship, you can advance your skills for free by following this blog.

In our next blog post, we will look at the second item on the list of the ABCs of Power.  Until then, have a great week.

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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.

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IMPLIED CRITICISM: ADVANCED LESSON

In last week’s post I began to discuss some forms of implied criticism.

dilbert indirect

In this Dilbert comic that we first looked at in last week’s post, we see that complimenting someone in front of another person can lead to an experience that feels like a subtle form of negative criticism.  Learning to recognize not only the most obvious types of negative criticism, but the more subtle forms as well, can improve our ability to handle difficult anger arousing situations.

A single lesson on identifying the more subtle forms of negative criticism is really not sufficient for most of us to actually begin to utilize this skill in a helpful manner.  Therefore, today we will practice this skill some more. Then we will look at an example of a woman who is dealing with a challenging interpersonal interaction.  We will see that by combining her knowledge of subtle forms of negative criticism with some of the other skills that she has learned from following this blog, a difficult anger arousing situation can have a positive outcome.

Last week, I mentioned that making a suggestion is one form of indirect negative criticism.  Let’s take a second look at this.

Suggestions

peanuts suggestion

Often when someone offers a suggestion, a criticism is lurking within the suggestion—sometimes the direct kind and sometimes the implied kind.  When Lucy suggests to Charlie Brown that “we just sort of slip away,” it implies that she has evaluated the team’s performance and she does not like it.

In the workplace, terms like “providing feedback” and “input” are often used as alternative terms to “offering a suggestion.”

 DILBERT INPUT

In addition to complimenting someone in front of another person and making suggestions, another indirect, implied type of negative criticism is making educational recommendations.

Recommending Education

Illustration by Lois Hubertz
Illustration by Lois Hubertz

 

Like the word “suggestion,” whenever you hear the word “instruction,” you would be wise to think that some criticism is most likely close about.  In order to make this point concrete, let’s go back to the scenario we used last week that involves Katrina and Betty, but let’s change it a bit.

In this example, instead of looking over to Betty’s wilting tomato plants and then making a suggestion to move the plants to a sunnier area in the garden, Katrina offers to give some “instruction” on how to plant tomatoes.  Although Katrina doesn’t directly say she thinks Betty’s skills can use some improvement, why else would she offer to provide her the instruction?  When people say, “I think your skills can use some improvement,” it is a form of criticism.

An Example that Utilizes the Skill to Recognize Subtle Forms of Negative Criticism

Let’s go back, once again, to the example we used in last week’s blog post.  Betty has invited Katrina over for some tea in her backyard.  The sun is shining and the birds are singing a pleasant song.  As the two friends chat, Katrina glances over at Betty’s tomato plants.

Illustration by Lois Hubertz

“Betty,” says Katrina, “let me make a suggestion.  Perhaps it would be better if you moved your plants to that sunny patch over there a few yards from your hedge.  They’ll get lots of sun there.”

“Listen, Katrina, I don’t care for your coming over here criticizing my gardening skills?”

“Criticize!” yells Katrina.  “I didn’t criticize anything!  All I did was offer a suggestion!”

Notice that in this example when Katrina provides Betty her “suggestion,” Katrina doesn’t recognize that she has indeed provided Betty negative criticism.  And then, when Betty responds to Katrina’s criticism by criticizing Katrina for criticizing her, Katrina gets defensive, shouting at Betty that she didn’t criticize anything!

This example illustrates the problems that can occur when both parties in a conflict are unskilled at dealing with criticism.

Let’s once again change this Katrina-Betty scenario a bit.  This time, let’s pretend that Katrina has been reading my blog and therefore she has been getting more and more familiar with some of its basic ideas.

Katrina looks over to Betty’s wilting tomato plants.  Betty,” she says, “let me make a suggestion.  Perhaps it would be better if you moved your plants to that sunny patch over there a few yards from your hedge.  They’ll get lots of sun there.”

“Listen, Katrina, I don’t care for your coming over here criticizing my gardening skills.”

When Katrina hears this, because she has been reading my blog, she quickly recognizes that Betty is now criticizing her.  Immediately, the image of a woman comes to her mind:

female-criticsmThen Katrina pauses.  She thinks about how she is about to respond to Betty, and notices that she is feeling defensive, and she is about to start shouting at Betty, denying that she has provided any criticism.  Katrina then thinks about my blog post titled RESPONDING TO CRITICISM:  FOUR LEVELS OF MATURITY.  She ends up saying to herself, “That response I was getting ready to give to Betty would be rated a fairly immature level–something like level 2 or 3.  What would a more mature level look like?”

Katrina then tries to come up with a response to Betty that would be more like level 4.  Katrina also thinks about what she learned about implied criticism from my blog and from this she comes to recognize that Betty is correct.

After a few more seconds of thought, Katrina feels pretty comfortable with the new response that she has come up with and decides to give it a try.  She recognizes that if her response doesn’t lead to something positive, she can always summarize in a caring way Betty’s concern and then say that she will think more about this over the next few days (see blog post Summarize and Delay).

And so, Katrina begins to respond to Betty’s angry reply:

“Betty” says Katrina, “you say that you don’t like that I criticized your gardening skills.  When I said what I said, I thought I was just offering you a suggestion.  But after some thought, I see you are right.  My suggestion does imply that I criticized your gardening skills.”

“It certainly did!” Betty says.

“I also see, Betty, that you don’t like to be criticized.  I really like you a lot, so now that I know this, I’ll try to be more sensitive about that.”

“No one likes to be criticized, Katrina?  Do you?”

“Well, Betty, actually I used to have a lot of difficulty dealing with criticism, but now I’m much more comfortable with it.  I feel that I can handle it in a warm, friendly way that helps me to understand what others are thinking about me and I learn wisdom from it.  There’s still some times when I find that it can be pretty painful to hear, and sometimes my husband gives me so much criticism all at one time that I end up asking him to back off for awhile.”

“That reminds me of today’s Sally Forth comic,” says Betty.  And after digging through her newspaper that was sitting on her patio table, Betty shows the comic to Katrina.

sally 1Sally 2sally 3sally 4

Smiling, Katrina says, “Yes, Betty, that comic does captures how I sometimes begin to feel when my husband, Frank, keeps giving me one criticism after another in a real short period of time and I do get so I want to clobber him.  Instead, we once discussed it when we weren’t all worked up and angry about something, and we made an agreement.  Whenever he begins to criticize me and I’ve had enough, instead of ruining one of his shirts, I just tell him in a loving manner that I’ve had enough for now.  He’s agreed to back off whenever I say that, and I do the same thing for him when he asks me to back off for awhile.  It’s less expensive then buying a new shirt.”

“Well, Katrina, maybe I am a little too sensitive about being criticized.  I think it’s because of how some people in my family criticize me.  I have a younger sister, and whenever she criticizes me, she starts to shout and call me an idiot.  And I know she knows how to criticize in a nice way because when she’s with her boyfriend, she’s so sweet when she criticizes him.  Maybe I should talk with her when we’re not in the middle of a quarrel about it.”

“That’s a great idea, Betty.”

Well, that’s today’s lesson.  I hope you found it helpful.

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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.

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DEALING WITH CRITICISM: LESSONS FROM DENNIS THE MENACE

In a recent post (Dealing with Criticism by Digging Deeper) I discussed some difficult situations that may occur when we deal with criticism.  There, I mentioned that in these types of situations, it can be helpful to do our best to describe what the criticizer’s most obvious desire is for providing the criticism and then to look to see if there are any other desires that might be involved.  To help us to dig a little deeper to find any of the other important desires in a difficult situation, I provided readers with two types of tools to dig, two types of shovels to dig, if you will.

a. look for the desire to be liked or loved.

b. look for the desire to be free to make one’s own decision.

Today, we begin to get some practice utilizing these two shovels.

PRACTICE

Consider the following Dennis the Menace comic:

dennis1

In this comic, obviously, Dennis’s mother desires that he straighten up his room. What other desires are important to consider?  It appears to me that Dennis’s mother is glaring at him.  Hmmm?  

When a boy hears his mom criticizing him in this way, there’s a chance his desire to be liked will feel threatened. Is there also a chance that there is another important desire in this challenging situation?

As criticism is being provided to us, we often begin to think something like, “I’m not going to let this person push me into doing something I don’t want to do. I’ll do whatever I want, and I don’t need anyone pushing me around.” This stance is part of what we call defensiveness.

EASING THE LIKING PROBLEM

When the desire to be liked and loved raises its mischievous head, we can let the person who has been criticized know that he is liked. This is what Dennis’s friend, Gina, does to lower the intensity of Dennis’s anger in the comic.

When Gina tells Dennis that his mom will cry if he leaves, Dennis is reminded that his mom really does love him.

dennis 2

Then Gina explains to Dennis that not only will his mom miss him, so too will his dad and dog. dennis3Dennis ends up deciding to resolve his conflict and go back home. Gina helped to resolve the conflict by focusing on easing the “liking” problem in this conflict.

Now let’s consider what we can do to help to resolve the problems in this situation by focusing on easing the “freedom” problem.

EASING THE FREEDOM PROBLEM

In the Dennis the Menace comic, while criticizing him, his mom could have offered Dennis the freedom to choose between two times to pick up his room. More specifically, she could have said something like this: “Dennis, I sure love you. It’s so much fun to have you around. It’s getting about that time to clean up your room. Do you want to do it now, or in an hour from now?” By giving a child a choice, a parent can come off as less bossy.

To male criticismhelp to come up with these types of ideas, the one thing I tend to do before providing criticism is to pause. Recognizing that I am about to provide criticism, and knowing that people tend to get defensive about not being liked and having their freedom threatened, I think about how to ease any perceived threat to these two desires.

SUMMARY

  • Many people associate criticism with not being liked.
  • Many people associate criticism with an attempt to reduce their freedom to make their own decisions.

Once we learn to be skillful at recognizing these types of conflicts, we are in a better position to come up with plans to either resolve them or to lower their intensity.  Therefore, in future posts I will be frequently providing examples that allows the reader to practice this skill.

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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.

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INTRAPERSONAL CONFLICTS AND CHARLIE BROWN: ADVANCE LESSON

A few weeks ago I published a post titled CONFLICTS WITH OURSELVES: LESSONS FROM CHARLIE BROWN.  Today, let’s quickly review the ideas presented there, and then move on to discuss a few more.

Review

When one person has a conflict with another person, we call this an interpersonal conflict.  An intrapersonal conflict occurs when a person has a conflict with himself or herself.

When we describe a conflict using the DIG Conflict Model, the letters of the word, “DIG,” helps to remind us to first dig to find the DESIRE, then something that INTERFERES with the desire, and finally, the GUILT.  Earlier, we looked at the following example of an intrapersonal conflict:

Charlie13

When we looked earlier at this example, I provided the following tentative description of Charlie Brown’s intrapersonal conflict:

Charlie Brown seems to desire that he not yell at his baby sister, but the fact that he did has led him to perceive that, interfering with his desire, he is likely to continue his yelling at his sister.  He appears to feel guilty for his actions by saying he feels terrible and hates himself.

It would be simpler to describe this conflict by saying:

Charlie Brown desired that he not yell at his baby sister, but he interfered with his desire by yelling at her.  He felt guilty about it.

In this simpler description, we still have all of the three conditions for a conflict–that is, the desire, the interfering act and the guilt.  But they all took place in the past.  To become an expert at dealing with conflicts, we must learn to describe an existing conflict as something relevant to the future.  This skill will help us to prevent similar conflicts from recurring over and over again.

Okay, so there’s our summary in what was presented the last time we discussed intrapersonal conflicts.  Let’s now move on to some more advanced ideas.

Advanced Lesson

Whenever we have a conflict with ourselves, we oftentimes present to ourselves some negative criticism.  In the above three panels of the Charlie Brown comic, Charlie Brown indicates he has evaluated how he treated his sister and he makes it clear that he doesn’t like what he did.  When we evaluate something and state we don’t like what we evaluated, we have provided negative criticism.

In an earlier blog, we looked at providing negative criticism during interpersonal conflicts.  We saw that according to the DIG Conflict Model, there are five levels of maturity when it comes to providing negative criticism (see blog post titled, PROVIDING NEGATIVE CRITICISM:  FIVE LEVELS OF MATURITY).  Level 1 is viewed as the most immature level, and level 2 is viewed as a bit more mature, and so on.  Readers of this blog were encouraged to familiarize themselves with the five levels, and then to use them in the following way:

First, they learn to recognize that they are getting ready to provide somebody criticism.

male criticism

Then they pause to think about how they are likely to provide the criticism.

Jack criticism 2

Then, before they provide the negative criticism, they decide what level of maturity the criticism they are likely to give is at.  If it is below level 4, they try to change the criticism so that it matches level 4, or even level 5.

In this example, the man is the employer of the woman who wrote a report.  After looking it over, he sees he is likely to provide criticism in a style that would best match level 2, which states:

2.  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.

Now, I understand that some of you might feel that the employer deserves a higher rating because he does explain what the offending behavior is when he says the report is stupid.  But this just indicates in some vague way that he doesn’t like the report using the insulting word, “stupid.”  In my opinion, his comment is not an adequate description of what he doesn’t like about the report to warrant a more mature rating.

Seeing that this type of criticism is a bit immature, the man’s job in this example would then be to try to come up with a form of criticism that matches one of the more mature levels.  One of the more mature levels is level 4:

4.   The criticizer states the criticism without bodily attacks, damaging property, glares, insults, threats, or shouts, and with enough details so that the criticized person, if he or she wills, can improve the behavior, idea, or appearance.  If the person receiving the criticism becomes defensive or angry, the criticizer empathizes without returning glares, insults, threats, or shouts.

In this example, by pausing and thinking about level 4, the man asks himself to describe his criticism in a clearer, more precise way than shouting “The report is stupid!”  To help him to clarify his thoughts, he uses the word “DIG.”  Thus, he says to himself that “I desire that in the future this woman who wrote this report will follow the directions that I give her and interfering with this desire is the fact that in this report she did not do so.  I think she is guilty of ignoring my directions.”

Having slowed down so he can think about this, the man now decides that the best way to provide the criticism to the woman is to wait until he has managed to calm himself down enough so he can speak to her using a respectful tone of voice and without any insulting words.  Then he will go over the first direction he had given to her and ask her to describe how she might have written the report so that he would have seen that the report writer is following his direction.  If she is not sure how to respond, he could then explain more thoroughly what he wants when she attempts to follow this direction.  After clarifying the first direction, he could go over in a similar way his second direction, and so forth.

Now, I don’t mean to suggest that this is the only resolution to this employer’s conflict.  For example, he could instead assign the best report writer in his company to mentor this employer.  The mentor would review each of her reports before she hands them in, show her copies of high quality reports, and so on.   The point is that this employer can improve the quality of his criticism by pausing before providing the criticism, thinking about how he is preparing to provide the criticism, comparing it to the five levels of providing negative criticism, and then seeking a way to change the criticism to something that matches a more mature level.

With intrapersonal conflicts we carry out a similar plan as we do with interpersonal conflicts.

Let’s return to our Charlie Brown example:

Charlie13

Here we see that even before first recognizing he is about to provide himself negative criticism, he has already done so.  That’s not the end of the world.  Many old habits are not easy to change quickly, and if you find yourself slipping into past styles of dealing with conflicts, you need not beat yourself up over this.  There are better ways to helpfully carry on.

In our Charlie Brown example, even after having already provided negative criticism, he can still go through the steps we discussed for dealing with interpersonal conflicts.  That is, he can first look at how he did criticize himself and then compare it to the five levels of providing criticism.  Then, he can pick out which of the five levels best matches his response.

In my judgement, Charlie Brown’s response falls somewhere between level 2 and level 3.

Level 2 states:

2.  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.

Charlie Brown, in this example does state what the offending behavior is.  That is, he says, “I shouldn’t have yelled at her, she is only a baby.”  But to match level 3 his response would have to look like this:

3.  The criticizer clearly states the criticism with enough detail so the criticized person, if he or she wills, can improve the behavior, idea, or appearance, but couples it with glares, insults, shouts, or threats that are not about bodily harm.

Charlie Brown’s criticism of himself, in my opinion, is not quite clear enough to fully match level three.  The fact that he repeatedly says he hates himself seems to be an example of insulting himself so that part of his criticism matches both level 2 and 3.

Once Charlie Brown figures out about what level his response had been, he could then see if he could come up with a response that better matches a more mature response, perhaps level 4, or even level 5.

Attempting to describe interpersonal conflicts using the letters in the word “DIG” can be helpful for coming up with a more mature response.  Similarly, attempting to describe intrapersonal conflicts using the letters in the word “DIG” can be helpful for coming up with a more mature response.  What would that look like?  Here’s one way Charlie Brown can do this:

He tells himself,

I desire that I not yell at my baby sister, but the fact that I did has led me to guess that, interfering with my desire, I’m likely to continue yelling at her.  I feel guilty for my actions.

Notice that there are no insults in this statement.  This statement is an important step toward coming up with negative criticism that matches a level 4 or 5 response.  Charlie Brown still must go on from here to come up with a plan that can help him to become less likely to yell at his baby sister.  Next week we will begin to look at some plans to help him do just that.

Practice

For those of you who truly want to become a master at dealing with intrapersonal conflicts, I recommend that you now take the time to either print out the five levels of providing negative criticism (see PROVIDING NEGATIVE CRITICISM:  FIVE LEVELS OF MATURITY) or if you don’t have a printer, write them out in any way you can.  Then, tape them to your refrigerator door.  This week, each time you see them, try to recall some time that you provided negative criticism to yourself.  Try to recall just what you said to yourself.  Then, try to see what level best matched what you said to yourself, and if it is less than a 4 or 5 level, try to create a response that would match a higher level response.  With this type of practice, you will soon see some real progress in your skills to deal effectively with intrapersonal conflicts.

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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.

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ANGER, RUMINATION, AND MEDITATION

Recently, I published posts that discussed dealing with your anger that might arise when you are criticized (see BEING A WISE FRIEND TO YOUR ANGRY SELF, PART 1 and BEING A WISE FRIEND TO YOUR ANGRY SELF, PART 2).  The techniques that are recommended in those posts can be helpful for those who are upset about what was said.  But there are times when we are criticized and we get angry and we kind of think it’s about the criticism, but it really is about something else. Perhaps we realize that if someone else had criticized us in the same way using the same words, we would have been fine about it.  Nevertheless, we ended up getting furious because of who said it. We then went home and our anger about what happened just kept coming up again and again.  We wish it would just stop, but it doesn’t.

Such ruminations can be helpful.  Each time we think over the memory in light of what we have learned since the event first occurred, we might think of some better ways to deal with the conflict.  Then, if a similar event does occur, we may find that we are better prepared than if we hadn’t repeatedly mulled it over.

Despite their helpfulness, there are times when again and again an angry memory keeps creeping ever so annoyingly into our consciousness so that finally we conclude it doesn’t seem to be doing us any good.

Margaret was terribly abused by a man when she was a child. She now finds that even though twenty years have passed, each time she begins to develop a promising relationship with a guy, he ends up doing something that somehow reminds her of something that happened during the earlier abusive relationship. She then ends up recalling all that she had suffered. This leads her to act in a manner that is way out of proportion to what the new guy has done. The new guy runs for the hills and the woman, when she has calmed down, wishes she can become less sensitive.

Illustration by Eric Sailer

There are several approaches that we will be discussing in future posts to help deal with such disturbing ruminations. Today, we will focus on meditation.

Meditation

For thousands of years people have advocated that sitting comfortably while resting one’s thoughts on a mantra—that is, an object to attend to—can help to ease the burdens of life. Teachers of meditation usually mix in ancient wise counsel as the student learns this beautiful art.

Research has demonstrated that meditation can be helpful for improving empathy, working memory, the ability to focus, and relationship satisfaction, as well as reducing stress, anxiety, and ruminations.  Evidence also suggests that mindfulness meditation has numerous health benefits, including increased immune functioning (see http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/07-08/ce-corner.aspx for a review of the research.)

For those who want to give meditation a try before entering into a course or participating in many of the available wonderful retreats, I offer the following.

A SIMPLE, EFFECTIVE FORM OF MEDITATION

Illustration by Jack Star Rubin

Set aside about twenty minutes. Preferably, choose a time when you haven’t eaten for at least an hour.  This is because right after a meal your stomach begins to work hard to digest what you have just consumed.  It is better to wait until much of this is over.  This way your body can devote more of its energy for your journey into the deepest levels of your mind.

The only tool you need is a clock or watch so you can know when the twenty minutes are up.  Select the most quiet, comfortable place you can find for sitting. With this form of meditation there is no requirement to sit in any unique fashion.  If you desire to shift your position at any time, feel free to go right ahead.

Begin by checking the time and then figure out what time it will be when twenty minutes will have passed.  Then close your eyes, take a deep inward breath, and as you exhale, let your whole body deeply relax.  For approximately thirty seconds, enjoy letting your mind drift wherever it wishes to go.

After the half minute has passed, begin to observe your breathing.  This observation of your breath serves as your mantra.  Do not try to alter the flow of your breath as you observe it, just observe it.  At first you may find that just the act of observing your breathing in and out will result in altering your breathing pattern.  This is very natural and a common experience.  There is nothing wrong with what you are doing when this happens. As long as you gently seek to observe your breathing without influencing its flow you are doing wonderfully.

Now, as you gently seek to do this, not only will you see yourself at times influencing the flow of your breathing, but you will also find, from time to time, that your attention will drift away from your breath altogether. In fact, it is a common experience.  Many of us find that we spend almost no time whatsoever observing our breath as we meditate, our thoughts instead drifting here and there on other matters.  Such experiences are a natural part of meditating.  You are doing nothing wrong.  There is no need to feel guilty.

When you notice that your attention has drifted away from your breathing, very gently see if you can effortlessly return to observing your breath.  If you can, do so.  If you find that your mind drifts back to something else, this is fine. The whole process is effortless.  This is one reason that it is so relaxing.  That is, you give your mind something so simple to do that it requires no real effort, and whenever you begin to drift from this no effort task, you accept this as just a natural part of the process without chastising yourself.

As you do this, from time to time check and when you notice that twenty minutes have gone by, take a deep in-breath, exhale, and then give yourself two minutes to let your breath and mind wander wherever they will go.  In this way, you ease out of meditation and return to your non-meditative state.

SOME QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

Over the years, when I taught people to meditate, the following questions were often asked.
1. Question: How often should I meditate?
Answer: The research demonstrating the effectiveness of meditation has not yet adequately compared those who meditate twice a day to those who meditate more or less.  Instead of research, we are guided by tradition and our own experience.

From traditional sources, twice a day appears to be the most common practice.  Dr. Herbert Benson, the author of the popular book titled, The Relaxation Response, and a leader in carrying out research on meditation, reports that once or twice a day is sufficient.

I recommend that beginners practice twice a day (preferably before breakfast and before suppertime) for the following reasons.  This is what I was taught by a yoga teacher when I first began to practice forty years ago and it has become a comfortable, valued practice for over 40 years.  Moreover, I have taught many using this technique and have never seen anyone who expressed harm from this practice.  There have been many who have reported dramatic improvements in daily functioning.

2. Question: If I don’t have time to meditate for twenty minutes can I gain some benefits from practicing for less time?
Answer: Dr. Herbert Benson reports that some studies indicate that practicing daily as little as ten minutes per day can produce significant improvements lowering your stress levels.  If you find that you don’t have even ten minutes a day to meditate, you might consider that age old adage that the time to meditate is when you don’t have time to meditate.

A young woman once told me that she didn’t have time to meditate even for ten minutes a day. “How much TV do you watch?” I inquired.  She smiled sheepishly and after a few seconds of calculating in her mind, replied, “Five hours a night.”  She quickly added, “Well, I have to watch my shows!”  In my view, this woman would be wise to reset her priorities.

3. Question: How does meditation help to reduce problems involving recurring angry memories?
Answer: As you meditate, among the thoughts that float into your awareness are angry memories.  When this occurs, you tend to be in a more peaceful state than usual.  The pairing of the memory with this peaceful state allows for a more dispassionate look at the events that had surrounded the original angry episode.  This process often leads to a perspective that is experienced as less threatening.  And sometimes an insightful plan suddenly emerges with great promise should a similar problem cross your path.

The meditation process has been likened to dying a piece of material.  Suppose you have a white sweater and you would like to dye it a nice royal blue.  The first time you dip the sweater in the dye solution and let it sit for a while, when you lift it from the solution you might not notice any change at all.  Upon soaking the sweater again in the solution, letting it sit for awhile, and then lifting it out, this time you may think you notice a slight change, but you are not sure.  You repeat this process several more times and slowly but surely you begin to see the color of the sweater becoming a wonderful hue. In this way, each time you sit in meditation, your anger will ease into something more beautiful.
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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.

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BEING A WISE FRIEND TO YOUR ANGRY SELF, PART 2

In my last post, I discussed BEING A WISE FRIEND TO YOUR ANGRY SELF.

Illustration by Deanna Martinez

I received some nice comments from people who found the suggestions helpful.  Thanks!

For some, the suggestions that I put forth on this blog are easy to carry out in real life situations.  For others, old habits that have been used in anger- arousing situations for years are not so easily changed.  This is true even when people become convinced that the new style makes sense.  After a few tries at using the new style and finding that the attempts come off as clumsy, many people may decide that the new style is just not “natural” for them.  They feel that their effort to change is really an effort to suppress their “natural” style, and suppression is not healthy.

The association of anger suppression with learning new skills to deal with anger is understandable, for when one has spent many years acting one way, learning alternative behaviors can be frustrating.  This uncomfortable sensation may be seen as the suppression of one’s “natural” mode of behavior.  It’s a similar experience to how actors might feel when first learning a new role or golfers a new swing.  At first the skill to be learned feels awkward and the early phase of learning can leave them to observe their heart racing and their blood pressure skyrocketing.

Illustration by Eric Sailer

To take a particularly vivid example, consider what happens when human beings have to go to empty their bowels.  When they are first born, they just empty their bowels anywhere.  No one that I know buys the argument that releasing your bowels whenever you feel like doing it is the natural way to live, and that suppressing the urge to release your bowel movements would be unhealthy.  Most of us now understand that when people feel the urge, they can learn to excuse themselves in a pleasant manner and then wait a bit until they get to a more private place to do this type of business.  No real damage is done if we can get to a bathroom in a reasonable period of time.

It is similar with anger.  To not wait until you get to a private place will end up leaving you in a nasty smelling, icky situation that would not be at all in your own best interest or in the interest of others you happen to be with.

Taking the time to calm yourself in the manner suggested in last week’s blog can work, but for most people, it takes practice.  By designing a program in small incremental steps and heeding the suggestions I will be making on this blog, the feeling of suppressing one’s natural behavior can be largely reduced or even completely eliminated.

First of all, Expect Missteps.

By studying the posts on this blog, it is likely that several situations will occur that you now find yourself handling much better than before.  If the response by others you are engaged with ends up being favorable, this will encourage you to utilize the same approach again and again until it begins to feel natural, that is, second nature to you.  Other skills will come off a bit awkward or you will get a less than favorable response, and you may experience frustration.  When you try the skill again, you may now feel unsure and your effort may lead you to interpret this as suppressing a more “natural” way to respond.  You may therefore give up and conclude that you are helpless to make a meaningful change in this type of skill.

A big part of the solution to this problem is to reread the section that discusses the skill, and then practice over and over in your mind a narrative that has you envisioning utilizing the skill.  When you can smoothly imagine in detail carrying out the skill, try it out again in real life.  You may have to do this a few times until you get it right.

Today, I will provide a little fun practice session to help to better learn the skill of being a wise friend to your angry self.

You and your Friend, Eric

Illustration by Deanna Martinez

You and your friend, Eric, are discussing the upcoming election.  Eric explains why he intends to vote for someone in the upcoming presidential election you believe would do an awful job.  After the discussion has gone on for awhile, eventually it becomes clear to you that neither of you are going to change your opinions.

It’s at this point that you feel your anger toward Eric rising up within you.  Before reading on, spend some time thinking about what you would now do. 

After thinking about this, consider trying to come up with a charming way to say to Eric you’d like to take some time to think about the discussion you have both been having and then leading the discussion on to another topic.  Envision in your mind exactly what you would say, and how you would say it.

Illustration by Deanna Martinez

After you have thought about this, see if your response includes summarizing for Eric his main points.  Then a smile, perhaps a good-nature pat on the back of Eric’s shoulder, and then a comment like, “Well Eric, by now you know my opinion about this and I certainly know yours.  We obviously disagree.  Nevertheless, I’m still very fond of you.”  Finally, a comment by you that indicates your willingness to continue the conversation after you had some time to reflect on what has already been said.

It is now later in the day.  You recall the conversation with Eric and anger rises up within you.  Think about what you would do to deal with this.

After thinking about this, reread last week’s post and compare and contrast it with what you came up with.  Practice this exercise until you can,

1. envision in your mind very quickly and smoothly coming up with a charming way to disengage with Eric;

2. describe how you wish to respond to your anger when it flares up after you leave Eric for the day.

When you can do this three times without using any notes, you will find that the next time a similar situation comes up, you will be able to handle it far better than you thought possible.
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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.

 

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conflict resolution

The Great Sea of Conflict

Illustration by Eric Sailer

Conflict is like a great sea.  At various times any region of this sea can become terribly turbulent.  When you get out on the Sea of Conflict, many of its regions look pretty much like any of its other regions and it’s not hard to get lost out there. 

Illustration by Eric Sailer

There is a region of this sea that is known as Anger.  There, storms are particularly likely to churn up, and some of them have the potential to be very dangerous.  It is for this reason that it is vitally important, whenever possible, to recognize when we begin to approach and enter into this region.  All too often, however, a sailor wanders into this region without knowing it because Anger frequently looks very much like the other regions out on the high sea.  At other times, sailors enter Anger not of their own volition.  The winds and storms of the great sea have blown even great sailors off course.  At such times, recognizing the region of Anger can be made difficult because what is visible to the sailor can look fairly calm, yet just below the waves treachery may lurk. 

Challenge is a region of the great Sea of Conflict that is very close by to Anger.  Because less experienced sailors are unaware that Challenge exists and where it lies, when they find that they are caught in an Anger storm they often succumb to the lashing of the violent waves.  Great sailors, in contrast, know about Challenge.  In fact, when caught in an Anger storm, just knowing that Challenge is just a knot or two away enables them to gather a sufficient surge of energy to carry out well practiced skills that give them a reasonable chance to reach relative safety.

With this image of the Great Sea of Conflict, please consider the following.

PARABLE OF RYAN AND BUD

Ryan decides to ask his friend, Bud, for a favor.  Before he does so, he walks through in his mind what might go wrong.  He knows that if Bud turns him down this will be very frustrating and make him very angry.  Ryan also knows that when he gets that way he begins to start shouting and insulting people.  “Man, I’ve lost some close friends when I blow up like that,” he says.  “The last time I blew up Ted shouted at me that I was a bully.  I’ve never heard from him again!”

To prevent doing this again, Ryan conjures up in his mind the image of the Great Sea of Conflict.  To prepare himself to be able to steer his ship from the stormy region of Anger to the relative safety of Challenge, he rehearses five times in his mind a plan he would carry out in the event that Bud turns him down. He rehearses in the same way on two more days.   

On the day Ryan asks Bud for the favor, indeed Bud turns him down.  Ryan finds that frustration and anger is beginning to build up in the pit of his stomach and smoke is beginning to shoot out of his ears.  Nevertheless, he is able to smoothly carry out his plan which consists of the following.  First, he replies to Bud’s refusal by saying pleasantly, “Well, I appreciate that you heard me out.  Thanks.  I’m going to hurry off.  I need some time to figure out my other options.  I’ll catch you later.”  Then Ryan gives his friend a quick nod, and leaves.

Illustration by Deanna Martinez

This Ryan and Bud parable illustrates the technique of putting off any in depth discussion of how you are feeling with a friend while you are experiencing anger.  There will be plenty of time to do this later after you have some time to calm down and to consider if any further discussion is worthwhile, and if so, the best way to wisely present your case.  Because of the nature of anger, it is crucial to practice this technique if you wish to be able to carry it out during an anger arousing episode.

If you continue to follow this blog from time to time you will find that I will be encouraging you to practice some skills in various ways. This will lead you to become a master sailor on the Great Sea of Conflict.

Assignment: Write one or two paragraphs that relates what you have just read to something that personally happened to you. Include not just what happened, but also how you were feeling while it was happening.

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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.