Category: Straight thinking

“Need” is not a four letter word

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Ever since the Declaration of Independence 237 years ago, the concept of self-reliance has been instilled deeply into our consciousness. As a nation, the fledgling United States was not going to have to answer to some mother/’nother nation. Fast forward a few years to frontier days, and the concept of the lone cowboy or sole homesteader reinforced that independent ideal.  Perhaps the Women’s Movement piled a few more bricks onto this wall of expectation, with quotes (widely attributed to Gloria Steinem) such as “a woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle.”

No wads of panties, please; I’m an ardent feminist (actually humanist) and do feel there is value in self-reliance and independence for all. The problem once again is the all or nothing bent the culture widely attributes to the concept of needs, given the above background: needs are bad. I’m a good person if I can take care of all my own needs, and a pitiful loser if I don’t. No one wants to be needy, and of course our dichotomous brains snap like a magnet to that interpretation of needs.

Recently, I heard the phrase that is the title to this post, and realized how often we do actually treat our needs as something to be denied, avoided, even damned. The need to look strong and run from any possibility of being labelled as needy is endemic, and I hear sad stories again and again about the toll this belief takes.  A woman with breast cancer who revealed her illness only after treatment left her so ill she could not function. A family suffering the loss of a loved one who refused the help of meals. A friend traversing a divorce who revealed the fact only once the divorce was final.

We fear that if we speak up about our need for help, not only will we violate the unwritten code of strength, but we’ll bother or burden those who love us. We’ll slip into that category of needy, and they’ll shrink from us, unwilling to take on one more task in their already swamped lives.

Perhaps the best perspective to adopt when evaluating whether you should clamp your own mouth shut and not reach out to others in time of need is to practice a reversal. How would you feel if you found out a dear friend or family member was traversing one of life’s dark valleys and denied you the ability to help? Almost universally, we want to help–and feel deprived and even insulted if our friends don’t trust us enough to reach out and honestly express their needs.

Back to the pioneers. They weren’t really completely self-sufficient, but traveled in wagon trains because that increased odds of survival. The founding fathers had an enviable network of support, like-minded souls sharing lively debate over a beer. The reality is like the potty-training book Everybody Poops. Everybody has needs.  No shame. Not an unspeakable expletive. Accepting support, emotionally or practically, is a great way to bond with others, as well as get what you need out of life.

To me, at twenty, with love

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Such energy, such determination, such inspiring plans! For a scant two decades of life, you sure are cocky.  You know you’re book-smart. You’ve known that since you won that homonyms contest in fourth grade. You are beginning to believe that you are beautiful. This, thanks to a campus full of testosterone-driven boys, boys who didn’t know your gawky, clumsy, yet brainy seventh grade self, towering intimidatingly above their skinny, pre-hormonal selves. You have a dad who has preached, from his perpetual preacher’s stance, that not only are you smart and beautiful, you can expect to accomplish whatever you want. All a recipe for cocky certainty.

The perfect life, defined by boxes to be checked off, is one you feel certain to build. Certain you will finish the current psychology degree and the next, to take you on your chosen path of meaningful, yet financially stable work. Work that will make a difference in the lives of others yet still allow that ever-important flexible mom schedule. Certain you can build a relationship with the ideal loving man and establish a home for children, another way you plan to contribute to the world. Certain that if you do all this in the Right Order: finish school and training, snag the guy, launch the career, then and only then produce that yearned for grand-baby; your life will be perfect. You will be happy. Fulfilled. Productive. Balanced. Parents proud. You will be in control.

I bite my tongue to stop the inevitable tsk, tsk from escaping my head. You are twenty and know it all! Yes, it will work out, though I really don’t need to tell you that. Most days, you simply, whole-heartedly, are certain fairy tales come true. Allow that belief to carry you far, quieting those doubts that bubble up in the still night hours, dark-thirty. Because even as you barrel on, the ruts of doubt deepen, parallel paths that die hard.  From a quarter century later, I see the undercurrent to your bravado, hidden depths of worry, doubt, full-fledged anxiety. Are  you really good enough? Lovable enough? Do you matter enough?

Drink and dance hard, do your homework, flirt with boys. Charm the professors, call home once a week, volunteer for the crisis hotline. Be on time, shelve stacks of library books, save your money. Be the good girl, do what smart girls do, and maybe that will be enough to fill those ruts, dam that undercurrent. Jump through the right hoops, and you’ll feel in control.

Control is an illusion, my dear. You think the grand design in your head will automatically come true, detail by precious detail, because it’s what you want and you’re doing the right things. Dreams come true. Yet, like constantly shifting clouds, the only certainty is that the dream morphs. You envision one prince charming; another is, in fact, the one you need. You imagine constantly adoring and adored children; the vehemence that can fly both ways at 2 and 13 is horrifying. You paint the picture of one life; destiny insists you’ve drawn this lot instead.

I know you’re afraid of heights, but this is not one of those dreaded fire towers that your parents dragged you up, open wooden steps with a shaky splintered railing. As the path you plan to forge diverges, step back, climb to the highest point, and seize the bird’s eye view–in spite of your fear.  If you’d taken the predictable, planned path, you would have missed this gorgeous vista.

Surrendering to uncertainty is not a concept you embrace as part of your grand life plan and it’s illusion of control. Surrendering to reality equates to loss. Grab the box of tissues, release the tears, this isn’t what you ordered. You are certain surrender looks like this: pain, suffering, anxiety to be feared: 

When in fact, surrender looks like this:

 

You think you know it all, and that, in true all or nothing style, the details are essential to fulfillment of the plan. You are certain that achieving the plan, unaltered, will bring peace and security. Failure, defined in that absolute way, means no rest from the worry and doubt. Give it up. Surrender is acknowledging the illusion that you are in charge. Simply, wholeheartedly, be certain about that truth, and allow life to delight you with surprising vision. That is, after all, exactly what you need.

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This post is part of a BlogHop for a group of midlife bloggers called Generation Fabulous (GenFab for short).

Fifty Shades of Grey You DO Need

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Fifty Shades of Grey, the first book in the Fifty Shades trilogy by author E.L. James, has been on the New York Times bestseller list (along with the other two books in the trilogy) for thirty-three weeks, and counting. There is buzz about the film.  Even bigger buzz is about why the book has been such a hit, and inspiring either “love it or hate it” reactions. I confess, I haven’t read anymore than the first sample chapters that I could get for free on my iPad–and that didn’t drive me to instantly download the rest of the book. Since I was only mildly intrigued, the book has slipped to my “spare time” reading list.  Seems to be another way that psychologists are just like you, for there it stays, waiting for either a classic Dallas ice storm stay-at-home day or a broken leg.

While I am not recommending that fifty shades of grey, there are fifty shades of gray that most of us all-or-nothing thinkers need in our lives.  All or nothing thinking is that thinking trap that I write about frequently because it fuels unhappiness so powerfully:  success or  failure, with no grace in between. Either I parent perfectly, never yelling at my kids, or I’m a bad mom. I earn all As, or I may as well flunk out. My house is spotless, or I’m a rotten housekeeper.

This black and white thinking pattern is so common that we can probably write it off to simply being human. In the course of the evolution of the species, questions with yes/no answers contributed to survival. You steered clear of the saber tooth tiger, or you got eaten. You avoided the poisonous berries, or you died.  Humans who had this “all or nothing” decision tree burned into their brains are the ones who survived. AND lived to reproduce. Here we are, their descendents, only doing what we have evolved to do: reasoning in very black and white ways. We get it honestly.

But the world is not very black and white any more. Decisions aren’t as clear. We stress ourselves less when we learn to look for the shades of grey, particularly when evaluating success or failure. There are innumerable shades of grey along the continuum of our lives, degrees of accomplishment. In defeating this all or nothing thinking in your head, it helps to consider the grey. Count what you have accomplished.

Here’s a little tool for remembering to look for the shades of grey in your life.

I give these out as bookmarks, to remind black and white thinkers to look for the grey. Yes, it’s a paint sample strip.  If you, like me, are plagued by all or nothing thinking, drop by your local paint store and pick up your own.

What form does your all or nothing thinking take? How can fifty shades of grey to shift your perspective?

 

Won’t she just grow up?

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Hardly a girl escaped exposure to middle school terrorism: biting criticism about clothing, mean notes circulating, gym class taunting, teasing about lunchbox contents, cliques loudly discussing parties from which some were excluded. Even if you weren’t a target, bullying was surely on your social radar. You may have cringed as you witnessed it, rigorously monitoring your own behavior to avoid attracting the same fate. Perhaps you eventually breathed a sigh of relief, finding your high school or college niche, feeling strong in your network of supportive women. You grew out of it, beyond it, and trusted you were done with that phase of your life, having to dodge or defend against mean girls.

Then you joined a mom’s group, the PTA, or even a work setting;  flashback to middle school. Gossip flies: “did you hear what happened at Joni’s bachelorette?” Criticism is thinly veiled: “can you believe she doesn’t vaccinate her kids?” Exclusive social events are whispered or bragged about: “girls’ escape to the lake house this weekend.”   You dash out of work at lunch to volunteer for the band, only to have other volunteers ignore you and chat among themselves. When you excuse yourself for the return dash, one exclaims, “oh, too bad you’re a working mom.”  You proudly dress for a party, feeling good about the style you assembled from Nordstrom Rack, until other guests begin to brag about their $465 boots and $800 jeans. Bullying is not confined to middle school.

Relational aggression (RA) is one form of bullying. According to Cheryl Dellasega, PhD, author of Mean Girls Grown Up, RA is verbal violence in which words, rather than fists, cause damage. October is Bullying Prevention Month, a good time to look at the ways in which RA continues to have a sneaky presence in women’s lives, regardless of age.

Competition and comparison seem to be human nature. An inherent gauge of success is how our accomplishments measure up to those around up. So keeping score–and possibly bragging or lamenting about it–doesn’t stop. Social media such as Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest are injecting it with new adrenaline for all ages. How many friends do you have? What glorious picture of your life can you paint with your tweets, pins, posts? Even at midlife and beyond, opportunities to “top this” and criticize abound. “Can you believe her son still hasn’t graduated?” “They spent that much on that wedding?!”

If you find yourself a target of RA, your first thought might be “I thought I was done with this; can’t she just grow up?” Here’s my short list of quick tips to cope with adult relational aggression directed at you:

1)  Expect people to be who they are. Bullies don’t automatically grow out of it as they grow up. If an acquaintance seems like a bully, trust your gut that you are reading it accurately. Expectations are our biggest enemy (check out my list of posts under “Expectations” to the right, for further reading) and thankfully, one category that we can control to improve our well-being. Bullies just are. Don’t expect them to be otherwise, and their tactics will lose some power.

2) This is not about me. You aren’t the problem, the bully is. You are not deficient, weak, or unlikable. Behavior like this says it all about the bully, nothing about you.

3) Toxic people aren’t toxic if we fail to react. If you apply the first two tips, it’s much easier to step away and not react. Breathe. Dismiss. Let go. Invoke the mantra “what other people think of me is none of my business.” The final authority on approval lies within you.

Have you been a victim of adult relational aggression? How have you coped?

 

 

Not your mama’s bucket list

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Bucket lists inspire us to live life fully, drawing us into imagining all the high points we hope to experience in this lifetime.  Ideally, we seize the day, jumping into life to accomplish that bucket list well before any immediate threat of kicking the proverbial bucket that lends its name to the list. Bucket lists propel us forward.

Ever one to prefer shaking up tradition by flipping ideas around, I’m inspired this week by the opposite process. Look back, versus looking forward. Memoirs and end of life reviews offer retrospective, as defined in a post at Reason Creek, in this way:

Retrospect is a simple looking backward, it has no judgment implicit within it. Hindsight looks back over errors, reminiscing looks back with rose-colored glasses.

Bucket lists share the same challenge as “to do” lists. All those glorious aspirations can leave us feeling like failures because we focus on what we are not accomplishing. Too many ideas in my head about how many things to get done, and by what deadline, just leave me feeling pressured to be enough. I am working to be enough just as I am. I still love my “DID DO” list, where I assess what I have completed. When a friend shared that she was tallying her “bucketed” list, rather than her bucket list, I fell right in line.

Take that judgment-free lens of retrospective, shift away from what you still wish to accomplish, and tune into what you have completed in this life. Voila, you have the framework for your bucketed list. Turns out this is a grand-scale gratitude list, expanding daily appreciation into the vast landscape of a life.

To barely begin to tally how my bucket is filling, here’s a few thrills I am ever so appreciative to have had in my life:

  • Giving birth to my daughters, and nurturing them into incredible vibrant women.
  • Having the trust of hundreds of clients, who welcomed me as a guide on their own life paths.
  • Wakened from a warm bed by my mom, to view the spectacular Northern Lights.
  • Eating juicy, warm plums from the trees on my grandparents’ PA farm.
  • Watching my cat give birth to kittens.
  • Counting fifteen shooting stars in one week in New Mexico.
  • Sailing a small boat with my dad, cold waves lapping at our freezing buttocks as he laughed his deep, throaty chuckle.
  • Learning to sew with my mom, and earning her praise and a hug for my crooked, fumbled zipper.
  • Catching a stunned possum, just-awakened from hibernation, in a winter’s wood with my sister when we were girls.
  • Riding a fast motorcycle with a high school boyfriend. I have the revving scream of the motor memorized still.
  • Attending an outdoor classical concert complete with an awe-inspiring fireworks finale.
  • Sighting a pileated woodpecker, a few owls, and indigo and painted buntings.
  • Sighting more than 60 bald eagles in one day, wintering in trees along the Minnesota River.
  • Watching more than 20 hummingbirds, dancing their territorial and buzzing dance around a friend’s NM feeder.
  • Gathering sap from trees with buckets cut from bleach bottles, then simmering it into golden maple syrup.
  • Riding in a boat right next to a pod of grey whales, flanked by adorable calves.
  • Visiting the Chihuly exhibit after dark at the Dallas Arboretum (see featured photo)
  • Seeing the “green flash” as the sun set over the bay in Florida.

What cherished experiences do you have in your bucket?

Daily gratitude practice, updated.

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The recommendation to make a daily gratitude list has become so common that your brain might be shutting down right now.  Yeah, yeah, you grumble.  The research is clear that sitting down each evening to list blessings in your life can increase happiness and well-being. And everyone older than three or younger than ninety knows it. “Lay off us, we’ve heard it before,” you may be thinking.

I struggle with it too. I know reciting my gratefulness can enrich my life, tempering the days I spend listening to woes galore. But do I do it? I’m just a lowly human being, and maybe this struggle is another way psychologists are just like you! When I’ve tried, I quickly get into a “CD on repeat”-type litany, writing about the same loved ones, health, strength, and security day after day. Starts to sound like blah, blah, blah in my head, and I doubt how that low level rumble can even make a dent in my psyche.

Doing my duty as a psychologist, making an effort to improve my skills, I was listening to an online seminar in my car. Selfishly, often: I want to improve my bag of tricks for clients and blog audience, but I also like to make my life easier. The name-escapes-me-today (see, I forget, just like you) speaker said that, in an effort to fulfill his own gratitude practice, he tries to find a new experience or moment to savor each day. This motivates him to move through his day mindfully, given that mindfulness also enhances our perception of living a good life. Throughout the day, he checks in routinely, keeping part of his brain attuned to new experiences or moments to appreciate.

I liked this. In even the worst days, there is at least one thing that lights me up, makes me smile. A kindness, a compliment, a hug. Often, there is one small item that makes me smile–or laugh out loud. I often text these ‘finds’ to my daughters, as a fun way to keep in touch.  I think I could do this. I set out to add this to my practice of bits of life to notice.

Meanwhile, the other challenge in my head lately is exactly how to jump into Twitter. The promise is that Twitter could increase my exposure, help me share my expertise, build my business. Since I announced my intention to do so, it’s been like learning to drive a car with a clutch.  Shift, stall, grind the gears. NOT quite as bad as sitting in the ’67 VW at the top of a hill with my dad alternately cajoling and yelling at me. But a struggle, to figure out what might shine even a tiny bit in the vast Twitter universe, making my comments worth a follow.

Grind, grind, go the gears in my head, chewing up gratitude ideas with tweets. The result that spewed out is my new daily gratitude practice. Each day*, my goal is to notice and tweet one event that made me smile. Since it appears that a clothing company already has a campaign linked to the hashtag #dailysmile, I’ll be using #dailysmiles.

Join me, won’t you? Follow and retweet–or let me inspire you to notice and tweet your own daily smile.

 

*(hey, I’m warning you, I’m only human.)

Are you a sponge or a brick?

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The need for approval leads many women to sculpt and mold their bodies, personalities, even lives to fit either/both a societal ideal and an individual’s expectations.  Maybe the recent Olympics launched tears of boredom rather than emotion in you, but you smiled and nodded at others’ enthusiasm. In most women’s lives, it’s an ongoing struggle to find that balance of being fully me while still pleasing others.  Back in February, I explored this need for honest truth in our relationship lives, concluding that loss of self for the sake of a relationship does not lead to a happy life. It’s not a good idea to “give up me to be loved by you,” as the classic book says.

Healthy or not, backed by psychological science or not, it is often true that we are attracted to those who have characteristics that we seem to be missing. An introvert feels that that wild party person will fill life with greater fun or connection. A serious planner loves the spontaneity of that ”live-in-the-moment” person.  In the words of Jerry Maguire, “you complete me.” In the best incarnation of this trend, we seek out relationships with those who help us grow, challenging us to be the best ME we can be. It’s healthy to be a little putty-like, flexible, inspired to try on new interests, characteristics, even personas. And, ideally this is mutual. You both want to meet in the middle, stretching yourselves to be more. In long-term relationships, a sign of health is the ability to adapt to the growth of one’s partner.

(In the worst case scenario, we come to hate the very traits that drew us together in the first place. That spontaneous person fails to follow through on any planning.  The introvert needs more quiet time. We lose track of what we liked about each other at the beginning. But I digress . . .)

The grown-up challenge to the adolescent “but everybody is doing it” refrain may apply, even though you might cringe at the comparison: “Are you really going to jump off a bridge because your best friend is?” Don’t be a lemming, and follow even one other lemming off the cliff if that doesn’t feel consistent with who you are.  Do you have to homeschool your kids because your friends are and the schools do seem so scary and inadequate? Must you embrace S&M just because Fifty Shades of Grey is hiding on everyone’s ebook shelf and it might enliven your own gray sex life, even if the thought seems laughable or offensive to you? Do you have to start running because your partner does and it’s “good for you” when it makes your knees ache?

Check out this checklist about sacrificing too much for a relationship. When considering what and how much to change when the inevitable push comes from those we love, it is important to be mindful, thoughtful, careful in evaluating what parts of ourselves we do want to alter. Is this inherently good for me? Can this person inspire in me a healthy degree of change, versus complete transformation or loss of me? Will this benefit me outside of this relationship? Is this consistent with my values? What do I want to do?

The biggest challenge of our lives is to be our own version of our best selves, in the face of pressure to be someone else’s ideal, whether that someone is a loved one or the culture. Be neither a sponge–squashed and shaped to others’ ideals– nor a brick–rigid and unaffected–in your own continual evolution to be YOU.

 

The flip side of approval-seeking

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I never seem to quit thinking on a topic, even after I’ve written a blog. Last week, I explored the need for approval. That post was triggered by new research that confirmed my thoughts: that affirmation from others makes us happy. While we may not need others to rubber-stamp our lives, getting that little boost of “you’re okay” certainly can boost our mood. We don’t require it, hopefully; we just like it.

As my brain pendulum seems to do, my thoughts have now swung to thinking about the opposite: not needing approval at all. COMPLETELY independent, perfectly secure individuals may seem to be able to live by the motto “what others think of me is none of my business.” But what about when that idea is taken to extremes? Worst case scenario, what kind of person eschews the opinion of others 110%?  If I let my creativity run rampant on that idea, I imagine a person who does whatever s/he wishes, without regard to the needs of others. How would we describe someone who is so inclined? Selfish, narcissistic, insensitive, completely wrapped up in him/herself. This sounds like a two year old throwing a tantrum, or maybe a self-absorbed adolescent. Or even a danger to society? The crazed gunmen who terrorize schools, theatres, etc. are out to please only themselves, not caring one whit about approval or affirmation of others.

It’s just one more balancing act; neither extreme is healthy. The goal is not to be utterly pleasing others all the time, nor to be pleasing only one’s self, even when disaster is not the result. Social creatures, we want to feel good about the core of our being. We need to like the basic person we are, and self-affirm the majority of our choices and qualities, even in the face of frowns from others. That degree of independence is a laudable goal. At the same time,  mental health calls for balance, attending to the needs, preferences, and safety of others.

Eschew approval? Think again.

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While I know this dates me, one of my favorite shows when I was a kid (granted, there were only about three morning kids’ shows from from which to choose), was Captain Kangaroo. Kindly, portly, huggable Captain Kangaroo was like a grandpa in the living room, jollying us along to learn those kid-focused life lessons, supported by his sidekick, Mr. Greenjeans. Not unlike a 1950s Dr. Phil, mustache and all. And at least as I recall, each episode ended with the mantra-like repetition of this message:

“You can please some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time.”

(and it’s funny that I can’t find any internet verification of this, so I guess I’ll just trust my memory!)

This lesson about the need for approval became well-ingrained in childhood, probably my first exposure to how unrealsitic expectations can set us up to feel unhappy.  From an early age, I tried to accustom myself to the idea that I didn’t need everyone to think well of me. Whenever I got caught up in that, I remembered the Captain, reminding me that a universal fuzzy blanket of approval simply wasn’t possible.  Fast forward to my college years of studying psychology, where I learned that, according to Karen Horney and other psychoanalytic thinkers, the need for approval and admiration were deemed “neurotic.” In other words, psychologically healthy people don’t need others’ approval. Instead, psychologically healthy people can offer themselves that approval.  I have preached to clients–and in my own head–that we don’t need any approval beyond our own. It’s just a nice bonus.

Yet, in my personal life and in the lives of my clients, that need for approval seemed pretty prevalent and powerful–maybe even universal. This means either that the psychoanalysts were wrong, and need for approval is simply human. Or that we are all a bit neurotic, all “bozos on the bus,” as Elizabeth Lesser proclaims in Broken Open. The truth is probably contained in each of these assertions. There is no such existence as perfect psychological health: we lowly humans all like approval. And as I wrote about in another blog, Captain Kangaroo was right, too. We can’t expect everyone to approve of us, all of the time.

Recently, some new research has shown that affirmation from others is indeed a major component of happiness. In a series of studies, participants rated themselves on measures of how respected and admired they felt, how happy they perceived themselves to be, and earned income. Repeatedly, the sense of feeling admired and a respected, contributing member of a group, was more strongly related to happiness than was financial well-being. The researchers dubbed this “sociometric status,” compared to “socioeconomic status.” Similar research has shown that an overall sense of belonging is related to happiness. These new studies expanded the finding to focus on how affirmed and respected you feel, above and beyond belonging.

Who says we don’t want to have approval from our peers? Sounds like a basic human need to me. Giving approval to ourselves may still be the cake of wellness, but a resounding sense that others agree with us about our value appears to be the icing on that cake. And the frosting has always been my favorite part.

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I’ve recently succumbed to the social media tide and finally am activating the Twitter account I’ve had for some time. I DO promise more regular “who says!?” posts here, but I seem to be stuck in a writer’s block lately. While I chip my way out with a healthy dose of self-compassion, if you wish tiny (140 character, to be exact) daily doses of my usual thinking challenges, please follow me on Twitter. A button has been added to my sidebar here to make that easy. Look forward to quotes, quick tips, and links to other items I find valuable. And I’d love to hear from you–feedback and suggestions!

Wandering in the web wilderness, we all need a friend. Come be mine.