Self-Care Is Self-Esteem – Part 2

Last time we talked about the fact that self-esteem is a real, on-going need. It is fundamental that we work toward meeting our real needs. Additionally, when you learn how to earn it from yourself, self-esteem can help you make better decisions and choices in life. You can be inspired to not let your life get stale or routine or become trapped in old emotional or mental patterns that can be limiting, if not destructive.

There are all kinds of ideas out there in popular culture about what self-esteem is and isn’t. The bottom line is that self-esteem is your evaluation of you.

In Part 1, we talked about that in order to have more self-esteem, you need to determine that you are a powerful person meaning - you give yourself the permission to take actions in life, to make decisions, etc. You don’t wait on others to tell you it is OK to do so. You don’t rely on others telling you what to do. And you do already have the authority to give yourself that permission - to be powerful enough to take the actions you need to take. None of us are helpless and we are not victims. Power is the willingness and the ability to act, to take action.

Also, self-esteem comes from working to get better and better at thinking and feeling. Look at and reflect upon your patterns of doing each and see where you can improve and grow. Finally, it is essential to evaluate your character. Do you act with integrity? Always? There is no self-esteem without integrity.

We concluded that discussion with Three Things to Do Daily - Be brutally honest with yourself about everything and tactfully honest with others. Be responsible. All or at least most of the time and always about the big things. You don’t have to be perfect. And integrity - Doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do.

All of the above is very doable and most of you do some or most of this already. If you have not read Part 1 or listened to the podcast, I would encourage you to do so. All of that said, what else is there to Self-Esteem?

A big part of self-care and, thus, self-esteem, is seeking to understand yourself. Why are you the way you are? As a silly example - “Well, I’m a Taurus, so that’s why I’m stubborn.” Seriously? Would you accept that excuse from someone else? Why are you stubborn? You like to be right? You hate change? You think you know it all? You don’t trust other people’s opinions or knowledge? What? You get the point. No, you don’t need to call me and do six months of counseling to figure out why you like strawberry ice cream. You just do. OK. Fine. But when you start to run into things like you realize that your lack of trust in love is messing up your relationships, then maybe it would be a good idea to understand why you don’t trust love rather than do without it in your life. Just saying. Learn to understand yourself.

Why do you immediately get defensive when someone asks you a question? Why do you fear losing yourself in a relationship? Why do you like challenges? Why do you hate challenges? Why do you feel like you have to prove yourself to everybody else? Why do you love the thrill of rollercoasters? Why do you love change? Why do you hate change? Why are you always drawn to the “bad” boys or “bad” girls? It is those kinds of things that can trip us up that we should start with. Once you have recognized and acknowledged the pattern, go deeper. Why do I hold on to these patterns or habits? What can I learn about me here?

Also, it is of paramount importance to seek to understand, at least on a working level, other people. Understanding does not mean that you have to agree or be the same, nor does it mean that you have to convert them to your way of thinking or being, nor be converted to their way of thinking or being. It is part of respect – toward self or others – to acknowledge differences and we all are different. I will give you an example of how this might play out in a relationship.

In Dating – Part 4 – Preparing Yourself for the Rigors of Dating – we talked about the Five Love Languages. The 5 Love Languages is a method of understanding how people prefer to give and receive affection. How, in some sense, we feel loved. Comprehending what has meaning to us in a relationship. I recently worked with someone who is in what she reported to be a really good relationship but there was one hurdle. Her partner expressed affection through lots of touching. She didn’t like being touched all of the time. Didn’t mean she didn’t like sex. She did. She just did not like the feeling of having her boundaries, her physical space, invaded all of the time by constantly being touched. She is like me in that our primary love language is acts of service.

Her partner could not understand that.  His primary love language is physical touch. So, who has to change here? Neither of them, in truth. The place to start is having the understanding of each other’s priorities. Have that conversation or series of conversations rather than, “Well, you don’t love me because you won’t let me touch you whenever I want to,” or “You never help me around the house.” So, instead of packing up my marbles and storming off, as we understand one another (and ourselves here), we can build stronger and longer lasting bridges toward one another by making accommodations over time out of respect and understanding. And in that seeking to honestly understand ourselves and someone else or other people in general, we also will generate more self-esteem from ourselves for ourselves.

Also, in seeking understanding, seek meaning. What do things mean to you? You are the only one who has the authority to make that decision. In the example above, what does it mean that one partner does not want to feel like she is being pawed or petted all of the time? It means, at least to her, that she wants to be related to in a way where she feels seen and heard as something and someone more than a sex partner. She wants to be related to on all levels as someone worthy of attention, affection, respect, compassion, and being understood, rather than constantly dealing with, “If you don’t let me touch your endlessly, you don’t love me,” which would not be true. Now I am exaggerating this a bit to make the point.

What do things mean to you? Another seemingly silly example. “If I can’t get to the grocery store early in the week, it causes me anxiety.” OK. We have established that understanding. Now, what does that mean? Well, it could mean I like to have my chores out of the way, so my weekend is free. It could mean that when I go, it gives me some time alone to decompress and be productive at the same time. It could mean that when I go on the weekend and the shelves are picked over and the store is out of what I need and want, it makes me unhappy. What do things mean to you? And what does something mean to someone else? I know someone with chronic pain issues, and they say, “I feel like shit,” a lot. Yeah, I understand that part, but I have no idea what that means. Does it mean the same thing every time they say it? Is it always about their physical discomfort or does it mean something else?

Bottom line – seek to understand yourself and then seek to understand others, even if you don’t agree with them or have the same belief system as them or have any desire to be like them. And seek to understand what things actually mean to you – The Kroger cashier was short-tempered with you. Does that mean they dislike you or were having a bad day or they were just really busy? And seek to understand what things mean to others. I am not trying to turn you all into therapists but if you will work with understanding and meaning, you will become better humans with more self-esteem.

This next step correlates to the third step in Part 1, in which I recommended that you evaluate your own character. We talked about it in terms of looking at establishing integrity and principles, and thus character. Do I live by my principles like not consciously hurting others? Do I do have integrity? Am I a person who keeps my word, etc.? Do I have the courage of my convictions? In this step, take it to the next level. Look at and evaluate your motivations. What motivates the actions you take? Are my actions taken with the motivation, the intention, of being honest; having integrity; being a caring person; establishing a greater level of closeness; whatever; or am I motivated by expediency? Expediency meaning - “I’ll get to all of the character stuff later when I have time or when it is more convenient but for right now, let’s keep things simple at all costs.” (or) “Let’s just go with whatever feels good at the moment or with what meets my desire for immediate gratification.” “I need leverage here, so I am going to manipulate the situation. I’ll just try to see what I can get away with here.”

Now, in Part 1, we talked at some length about dealing with yourself in bad faith. When you look at your motivations and intentions, you will know what is true for you, though you might hate to think it true. In a relationship, I want this and you want that, and that can be anything from where we go to dinner to establishing the boundaries and rules of our relationship and anything in between. And instead of working through the process of understanding, and that can be a quick process, I choose to manipulate you to get what I want whether that means Chinese for dinner rather than Mexican, or having an open relationship even though that is not what you want. Suppose you are having a disagreement with a family member or friend or loved one and they will say and do anything to be right, to win the argument, or they just want to shut you down. They want this to happen now – thus the sense of expediency. Clearly this kind of behavior is not OK, even if it reflects their lack of self-esteem.

A work example. How many of you have had the experience of working for a supervisor or manager who will say and do anything, out of a sense of expediency, to get you to do what they want right then? What they are saying or what they want may not even make rational or logical sense but nevertheless, they want you to do X and they will manipulate you into doing it. Or a manager who is such a control freak that if you walked in and said, “The sky is blue,” the response would be either, “Yeah but except when . . .,” or, “It is not. It’s . . .,” and they will argue you to the mat until you give up in exhaustion. This is obviously neither leadership nor even good or effective management. But, for them, it is expedient. It is what they need and want right in the moment. These people will not have much of any self-esteem to speak of and, having had exposure to these kinds of managers at some point in your life, you are acquainted with this kind of behavior and its potential impact.

Evaluate your own motivations and intentions. Are they motivated from character and integrity or from a need of expediency? The more of this kind of evaluation you do, and the happier you are with what you find, the more self-esteem you will have. And if you don’t like what you find, you are always in a position of power to do something about it.

Next step, this corresponds to the second step in Part 1 which is about honestly evaluating how good you are at thinking and feeling. How good are you at each? What are your patterns? Where can you improve or deepen these abilities? In this step, look at how well you integrate thought and feeling. As example. If you wake up in the middle of the night and hear someone moving about downstairs and you live alone, you are rightfully going to be afraid. Absolutely. However, if you suddenly wake up afraid in the middle of the night, does that automatically mean that there is an intruder downstairs? If someone says something that hurts your feelings, yes, you are going to feel hurt or at least a bit peevish. Right? But if for some reason you are feeling hurt, does that mean someone else said or did something to make you feel hurt or is it just a feeling passing through? If someone does something deceitful behind your back, you are going to be angry. But if you feel angry, does that necessarily mean someone went behind your back?

That you feel something does not always mean that there is a thought of fact behind it. As we have talked about before, that you have a feeling come up, in and of itself, is not a cause for either alarm or celebration. Is the feeling causing the alarm or desire to celebrate tied to anything? Or is it just a feeling passing through that floated up out of your subconscious mind and you need to let it go? In Self-Care is Knowing Your Default Reaction, we talked about habitual emotional responses. “I’m mad because you are late as always even though you knew we had to be on time for this event.” OK. But if I feel mad that doesn’t mean you were late. Anger, remember, is one of the default settings.

All feelings are legitimate in that you are feeling them. But not all feelings are legitimate if the thinking that generates them is not accurate. “You’ve been sneaking around a lot lately, so you must be up to something. You’ve been very secretive and that must mean you are seeing someone else, and I am jealous and hurt.” “No, actually I have been trying to plan a surprise birthday party for you and you know I have a terrible poker face. I can’t hide anything well.” But when you feel something, acknowledge the feeling and then see if you have any valid or logical reason to feel that way rather than denying your feelings. Just don’t let your feelings run your life. And if the feeling isn’t tied to something in fact, let it go.

“If it feels good, do it.” Remember that old trope? That it feels good doesn’t mean it is a good idea. “I really like feeling mellow at work, so I am going to smoke a blunt before work.” But walking into work reeking of weed and looking buzzed may not be a good idea. Also, we need to become really well acquainted with ourselves and our patterns and to learn to differentiate between real feelings and the urgings of our ego. We may feel, for example, that our boss is a complete toadstool and that they deserve to be informed of that posthaste. However, looking at the logic of that, maybe not so much. More likely what our ego wants here is for us to express to them that we consider ourselves better than or superior to them. Probably wouldn’t be good for job security.

You need thinking and feeling together in order to make decisions on what actions to take in your life and then you need to be able to evaluate how good of an idea it was after the fact. So, the question in this step is – How good are you at integrating your thinking and feeling? Do you do just fine until a feeling comes up and then it all goes off the rails? (see blog and podcast Feelings, Wo-O-O Feelings) Or do you think and think and ruminate and stay all up in your head and won’t go near feelings for love or money? “Doesn’t matter what I felt. I think this or thought that.” When you try to separate rather than integrate thinking and feeling, self-esteem tanks. Not only will the integration of thought and feeling boost your self-esteem, it will give you a much firmer foundation for honestly evaluating yourself. And you will also be amazed at how it will help your sanity levels.

The last step and it goes along with the first step of claiming your power. Here, and this in integral, is the determination of and commitment to the fact that we are not helpless. And yes, there are times when we find ourselves between a rock and hard place and can’t imagine a solution. But the determination to eventually find one will get us through it. Ask for help from loved ones and trusted associates, or from professionals in whatever field. Do research if necessary. Certainly, take a step back and see if you can gain some new perspective on the issue. Remember to breathe. Be patient, meaning look and listen over time for answers that make sense and feel right (see previous step). Keep on keeping on and that determination that you are not helpless, will help you find more personal power and generate more self-esteem.

Each of the steps, on its own, has value and will serve you well. Each of us must determine to be powerful and determine that we are not helpless. We evaluate our ability to think and feeling and then we evaluate our ability to integrate what we think and feel. We evaluate whether we are living by our principles, ideals, character, and we evaluate our motivations in everything we do. And we must seek understanding and meaning. This is a process that you can learn to work.

Finally, in Part 1 I told you three things to do daily that will change your life. They are – Honesty; Responsibility; and Integrity.

To those three, I want to add four more:

Trust. Now, my very first blog post and my very first Podcast are entitled But, But, I Trusted You. Learn to trust yourself and then others. A couple of take-aways from that short post. Say what you mean and do what you say. You will be more trustworthy. (Yes, you earn trust from yourself as well, not just from others.) Then evaluate - Do your actions match your words? You can learn to trust peoples’ behaviors, not necessarily what they say. As example. My brother, for a variety of reasons, is always late. Always. He will tell you he is in the process of getting ready early. He may tell you he is working on getting out the door. What I know I can trust is that he will be late. It’s money in the bank. Trust is a very big subject, but this can be a good starting point. Are you trustworthy? Are they? Do you/they say what they mean and do what they say? Do actions match words? How consistent are actions? It is through evaluating those actions and patterns of actions that you can learn what you can and can’t trust.

Listen to the messages life sends you. Pay attention to your life, not your phone. Life, the universe, whatever you want to call it, has a funny way of sending all of us messages. A song you hear that may strike a chord. A poem you read that resonates emotionally. A conversation you overhear that tells you something you needed to hear. Someone reacts to you in an unexpected (good or bad) way. Whatever it may be, pay attention to information coming into you from a variety of sources, especially those from beyond your phone screen. Yes, this is more esoteric, but it will trigger thought and feeling and, in so doing, kick you into evaluating and then integrating your thinking and feeling.

Let yourself listen to your feelings. Listen to your feelings, understand your feelings about this or that, and use the input to make better decisions, without letting your life be run by your feelings. What does your gut – not your ego – but your gut tell you about something or someone? Are your feelings in concordance or at odds with what you are thinking? Thought plus feeling equals emotions. And honor your hopes, goals, dreams, and desires as they are important to you, revising them as necessary.

Finally, never ever ever consciously hurt other people or yourself. That doesn’t mean you may not inadvertently hurt someone else’s feelings. But there was no intention to do so present. We aren’t perfect and sometimes we say or do the wrong thing, or we miss the opportunity to say or do the right thing. But never intentionally hurt someone else or yourself. “Well, I told you not to make me mad. You got what you deserved.” Nope. “I told you not to go there.” Nope. It isn’t what you say but how you say it and why you say it that will immediately impact your self-esteem.

Now, you don’t have to take my word that what all I’ve described will work to help you generate more real self-esteem and that it will be rock solid enough to lean on. Try it on your own. Give it some time and be open to the process and what can come of it. As you work with the components and the process itself, you and your life can change and don’t be surprised if and when it does. Let us know if you have questions or if we can help.

© 2022   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Living with Uncertainty

The most common complaint I hear from friends, family, colleagues, is that everybody is exhausted and worn down, to some extent or another, by living for so long in a constant state of uncertainty – about everything. In all aspects of our individual and collective lives, the ground under our feet won’t stop shifting.

What’s next? What’s coming now? What else? I walked into a Trader Joe’s on a recent Sunday night, a time I never usually shop for groceries, and was floored. All of the fresh fruit and veggies, all the bagged salad, bagged veggies, all of it was gone. Not an onion or banana to be had. I asked one of the employees if this is what the store usually looked like at 7P on Sundays. I was assured that it was not. They didn’t get in a truck. All I could think of were the stories I read in high school about the bare shelves in Soviet state stores and I wondered, “Is that where we are headed?”

Last September when we wrote about “The Hydra Head Of COVID,” we talked about the various kinds of impact that COVID has had on people, on their lives, on relationships, on who we knew ourselves to be. We talked about old structures and old ways of doing things, especially on a societal level, are crumbling and there aren’t many new ones being erected yet as states literally burn, the pandemic rages on, people are leaving their jobs in droves (the Great Resignation), and the truck with whatever essential goods didn’t come or isn’t coming.

One of my teachers on my path began talking of a “New Paradigm of Uncertainty,” back in 2018. Now, I usually try to make the concepts and ideas I write about practical and applicable. However, here we are going to have to venture into the slightly abstract for a bit to begin to unpack these ideas and make them more practical.

The New Paradigm of Uncertainty:

·       The Freedom of Uncertainty

·       The Wonder of Possibility

·       The Wisdom of Working Together in Harmony

·       The Courage to Keep Exploring

We are all apprehensive of uncertainty. We all like the certainty of, “This is the way the world works. Period. I like knowing what to expect is coming tomorrow.” Now we are all used to dealing with anxiety on a personal level. Will I make this meeting on time? Is this person “the one?” Will they like me? What will my new job be like? Who will my kids turn out to be? We all know that there are no guarantees and no certain outcomes but we have all developed certain strategies in different parts of life that we have come to rely on to keep the chaos at bay and usually ensure that things turn out pretty much the way we want and expect.

But what can we do when the trepidation of apprehension sets in? We can become anxious and fearful, even dreading what might happen and then we tend to lock down and man the barricades. Instead, keep in mind apprehension is not necessarily a bad thing. What is the immediate apprehension here? I may not immediately have an answer but part of the freedom that uncertainty gives us is that we get to make different choices as to how we respond to our apprehensions and forebodings. Does a decision have to me made right now or is it possible to take a step back and wait and see what other information or new ideas might come our way?

Several things to watch out for here. One is impatience. “I want answers right now.” And, if we don’t get those immediate answers, off we go into frustration and, sometimes, anger. Also, some decide to try to control all of the variables and force the desired outcome. Better to deal with the fear underneath the desire to control than to white-knuckle our way through life. For others, instead of outright impatience they decide, “I want to understand why something is happening before I do anything about it.” That is my fave.

When an outcome or future outcome is uncertain, use the freedom you have to choose and work toward – not control – the end result you want. I have the freedom to stop and look at and pull apart my fears and apprehensions. I have the freedom to make new and different choices. I have the freedom not to go into impatience or control or frustration or anger. I can work with those emotions to release them. And I have the freedom to keep amassing data and information as it emerges before I make decisions about an uncertain future.

And I have the freedom to change or alter my perspective. I have the freedom to try to see things differently. A silly example I’ve used before – A co-worker, with whom you are friendly, one morning is very curt with you. Do you decide that you should have known all along that they were rotten and no good or do you think that since this is someone you know, they may just be having a bad morning? Which perspective is correct? Who gets to choose? Perspective - What am I after? What am I trying to accomplish here? What do I hope for? How do I usually see things? What apprehensions need I deal with that might cloud my vision and my understanding? How might I see this differently? And when you find yourself absolutely sure about something, it never hurts to check – Are you certain?

Finally for those with anxiety, please reference our post and podcast entitled, “Running Anxiety.”

Wonder. Wonder gets a dirty name. “The wide-eyed wonder of children.” As adults, we don’t have time for that childish nonsense. Actually, we wonder all the time, only we do it in the negative sense of worry. What if we wondered about what new opportunities we’d like? Or what new chances would we like to begin again? What new hopes and dreams? Is any of this possible? Why not?

Too many of us, the idea of possibility is like walking into the paint store, hoping to find just the right color, and we get overwhelmed by too many options/too many choices. Some of us have reached a point of cynicism where our response to new possibilities is, “Yeah, the other shoe will fall.” However, we can gather our courage and be curious about positive new ideas, hopes, goals. We can sharpen our discernment of possibility with the wisdom we’ve accumulated from past experience. Thus, some possibilities might, upon further examination prove interesting and worth pursuing, while other possibilities won’t feel right, at least not right now.

In fairness, opening to the possible, the positive possible, in our times can be challenging. Thus, take it as something to practice doing over time, not something to do once and cross off your list.

Possibility leads to hope. And you cannot hope without being open to the possibility that it will happen. Finally, don’t be afraid to challenge your imagination to show and do more. What more could I imagine here? What is beyond what I can imagine? Not fantasy. Imagine.

The wisdom of working together in harmony. People fight the idea, that we are all in this together, kicking and screaming. Seems sort of self-evident that however the chaos of the world came to be, we all had a hand in it somewhere and, thus, we are all going to have to fix the world. COVID has and continues to make reaching out in person potentially problematic. But as it clears, turn from the uncertainty and reach out, in whatever capacity, to others involved in something that matters to you. This way you get to put your two cents in as to what will emerge from the chaos and come into being.

Yes, this is all rather esoteric, in a sense. It makes more sense once experienced. Uncertainty, admitting “I don’t know,” can open doors to knowledge. We also get driven inward to find an anchor and a refuge from the stuff outside that is uncertain. And in that process we can find stability. As external and internal security grows, we become more and more open to going with the flow of our life and letting it evolve rather than trying to control.

And, yes, it will take courage to keep exploring. Courage here does not mean absence of fear. It means knowing the kind of person you want to be and the kind of life you want to live and in that determination to keep exploring yourself and the world as the new normal emerges.

There is not nor will there be a quick fix for living with uncertainty, even as it will eventually subside as a new normal emerges. But take bits and pieces of the above as so suits you to work with. You just might come away less uncertain and more confident about the future.

© 2022   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Perfect

I clearly remember when I started hearing the response, “Perfect,” to pretty much anything said in a conversational exchange. Could be on the phone with customer service about my computer or the cable company and as they are asking me to try different things to get everything working, I would respond that I’d done whatever they had said to do. “Perfect,” was the response every time. “Well,” I tell a friend, “I’ve got to go to the grocery store tomorrow.” “Perfect.” “Then I thought I’d finally pick up the extension cord I’ve been needing.” “Perfect.” “I want to see if my right big toe will fit in my left nostril.” “Perfect.”

Now “Perfect” used to be reserved and used as a superlative indicating something was exceptional or had surpassed expectations in some way. Now it substitutes for, “OK.” At first, hearing the word more than I was used to was oddly comforting. We all like praise for doing well. But as it became more ubiquitous, it became oddly disconcerting. Things were being referred to as being perfect, but those things didn’t rise to a level where perfection should even have been a consideration.

Now I am reading in the press that the drive for individual perfectionist tendencies has become widespread and problematic since the early 00s. (Perfectionism Is Increasing Over Time: A Meta-Analysis of Birth Cohort Differences From 1989 to 2016 – published in the Psychological Bulletin of the American Psychological Association in 2017) The authors, Thomas Curran, University of Bath, and Andrew P. Hill, York St. John University write, “From the 1980s onward, neoliberal governance in the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom has emphasized competitive individualism and people have seemingly responded, in kind, by agitating to perfect themselves and their lifestyles. . . Cross-temporal meta-analysis revealed that levels of self-oriented perfectionism, socially prescribed perfectionism, and other-oriented perfectionism have linearly increased. . . the findings indicate that recent generations of young people perceive that others are more demanding of them, are more demanding of others, and are more demanding of themselves.”

While there are societal pressures eliciting this kind of behavior, let’s take a step back and have a look at how misleading and potentially dangerous this striving ultimately is.

Often, when we feel we have to do something perfectly or everything perfectly, we immediately run into two problems. First, perfect is the enemy of good enough. In truth, good enough is good enough. Why? Because, problem number two, for something to be perfect it must remain unchanging, static. Perfection is a static state. Works of art like a Monet painting are perfect because they hang on a wall and never change. They are perfect just the way they are. Humans are constantly growing, changing, and evolving. We are imperfect. Therefore, it is neither possible nor desirable for us to remain fixed because we learn, we change, we grow.

“I have the perfect solution,” and, therefore, we must do it this way. “I have the perfect idea or perfect concept.” Problem herein is that once something has been deemed perfect, it is given no room to change and evolve. We get so caught up in something being the one true way, that it almost becomes dogma versus a living, breathing process. We block out learning along the way. We can become absolutist rather giving ourselves the space to explore and learn. Why must something be perfect in order to merit taking action? Why isn’t it enough that a solution or idea is practical or workable or even a good interim step?

Are we allowed to make missteps or mistakes? Of course we are. Whose rules are these that we can’t? How else can we learn? Where else would the motivation come from to take risks, try new things? One thing I have learned as truth is that when I make a mistake, I need to be the one to hold my hand up, say, “Yeah, I did it.” And then ask for help or forgiveness or both. People will break their backs to help you. They won’t if you make excuses, try to place blame elsewhere, deny responsibility, or whine about how hard something is. But admit something isn’t working or didn’t work and, “Here, let me help you,” will be the response. And next time and the time after that and the time after that you’ll get better and better and better at problem solving or coming up with better courses of action, personally and professionally.

Very often, when we feel we must do something perfectly, what we are telling ourselves is that we don’t trust ourselves – our judgment, our thought processes, the quality of our work, our ability to honestly communicate in relationships, or our ability to be and do good enough. Think about what has become a stock answer to the interview question, “What is your greatest weakness?” “I tend to be a perfectionist in my work.” Problem here is that not only is it a cop-out answer, it can hide tendencies of being unyielding, intemperate, uncooperative, or unwilling to see other people’s point of view.

Beneath that, what is the fear? If we are not perfect at work, what will happen? Will we be disciplined? Demoted? Ostracized? Fired? In that process we will, in some way, undermine our own judgment and ability to think critically or creatively, and our trust in our own work. And it is us doing it to ourselves. How realistic are those fears? Yeah, the workplace is competitive and, in too many workplaces, the idea is that we are all replaceable in a moment’s notice. “Well, Schmendrick made a mistake or their work was less than perfect so let’s get rid of them.” Is that the kind of place you’d want to work? Are the people you work for really like that? Any great inventor, thinker, writer, etc., will tell you that they failed many times along the way to their greatest successes as it was those mistakes and the places where they fell short that they learned and changed their perspectives, or got new ideas or new inspiration, or found a new direction or solution.

In relationships, how can you or anybody possibly be perfect? What you will most likely do is wind up doing one of two things. One is that you will walk on egg shells around your friends or family or significant other. Heaven forbid you say or do the wrong thing. You could piss them off or make them unhappy and they won’t like/love you anymore. Or they will abandon/betray/humiliate you because you weren’t perfect? Or you accept whatever they throw at you, good and bad, so as to not jeopardize your standing with them and potentially lose the relationship. You wind up diminishing or invalidating your own needs in the relationship so as to not be demanding and, therefore, less than perfect. Or you lose yourself completely in trying to meet all of their needs so that they deem you the perfect friend, partner, relative, parent.

Think about the people who try to be the perfect parent. They often fall into the trap of trying to be their kids’ best friend instead of the person who teaches them how to best make their way through life and what it means to be fully and completely human in the very best sense of what that can mean. Teaching them to love and care and have compassion for themselves and others. Encouraging their dreams. Being there when they fall short. And also teaching them that everything in life comes with consequences – both good and bad - depending on the choices made. Thus, teach them how to make good choices. But nowhere in that is there a demand of doing it perfectly.

Think about the stress we place on ourselves when we hold ourselves to the standard of perfection. “I must succeed in doing the impossible.” Stress eventually wears us down and affects our physical, emotional, and mental health. Anxious, fearful, undermining our strengths and abilities, and what we know as our own sound judgment. We begin to question and doubt ourselves and self-doubt – whether you are doubting yourself or making someone else doubt themselves – is very damaging. Yes, be skeptical so that you can re-examine the way you approach your life and its problems. Yes, learn from that re-examination and that willingness to see things differently. But swan diving into self-doubt because you can’t be perfect is a no win proposition.

The demand of being perfect has been shown to lead to things like eating disorders and PTSD. It has also been linked to such issues as bulimia, anorexia, depression, anxiety, and more. It is not a healthy behavior and yet, I can hear someone thinking – “Well, at least we know what can happen. Perfect.”

Certainly in life, strive to do your best. Putting your best foot forward, in that sense, at work or with friends or family and, most importantly, with yourself, is a good thing. It means that you are open to doing better with everything you do, learning along the way, but also enjoying the journey in a way that demanding perfection never will allow. Some days you will be glorious in your achievements and other days – meh. Welcome to the human experience. Winston Churchill put it best, “"To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often." Change is really the only constant in life, as much as we may tell ourselves we hate change. But when we learn that we can improve almost anything in our lives, just a little bit every day, then we have opened the door to the potential of ongoing happiness and continued success.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Attention vs Affection

Attention and affection are both very important needs but they are different. Be clear as to which you are seeking and why.

Attention is a big deal. It is in the giving and receiving of attention that we become equal in one another’s eyes. If I pay attention to you or you to me, that means we have decided that this person is worth the time and effort and acknowledgment that attention provides. Nothing drives people up a wall faster than being ignored. It is certainly one of my pet peeves. There is an eyeglass store in Midtown Atlanta that has been in its location for a number of years now. Every time I have been in that store, none of the sales people have ever bothered to acknowledge my existence. Doesn’t matter how I am dressed, the time of day, nor the placement of the stars in the heavens.

We all want attention. We all seek attention. Why? Because it provides a sort of validation from others that in their eyes, we are worth them paying attention to. And as you have seen, in our current world, it seems like everyone is seeking to stand out and garner, and in many cases monetize the attention, recognition and validation they are getting, mostly via social media. Others use social media to hookup. They want the attention that provides, as long as it is “no strings attached” but the minute emotion, affection enters the picture, they move on despite the fact that what they are most likely seeking on a deeper level, is true affection.

Conversely, others of us, mostly us introverts, do not like attention or being in the spotlight. For many years I actively practiced hiding in plain sight and am still quite adept at being invisible, especially in a crowded room, in contrast to the people who strive to be the center of attention. They feed off the energy that the attention provides them, whereas for me, I find it exhausting after a while. I prefer operating quietly, behind the scenes, and am very effective in that role of making things happen without it having to be all about me. We shun the spotlight but that does not mean we shun accomplishment.

But regardless of whether you are a person who actively seeks attention, or welcomes it in limited quantities on occasion, or you do your best to avoid it, it is always – ALWAYS – useful to look at what you pay attention to in your life. The things you feed your attention to tend to grow and the things/people/places/activities we withhold attention from tend to wither and fall away in our lives. Do you only give attention to getting more and more attention or do you give attention, for example, to things like the important relationships in your life? Hard to do when you are constantly giving your attention to your phone. Just sayin’.

Do you give attention to needs like what makes you feel safe and secure in life – physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually? Do you give attention to generating a real sense of self-esteem from within or do you get caught in the insatiable and impossible task of seeking it from others?  Do you pay attention to your need to be really creative – rather than just pumping out content to stay relevant on social media? Do you give attention to creating and producing substantive accomplishments or are you relying on whatever captures your attention at the time? Needless to say, attention to self and one’s deeper needs like self-esteem, like being creative and being productive, is not only important but is paramount. Those deeper needs do not go away even when we get the dopamine hit that momentary attention provides.

We all need love and happiness; and passion and compassion; and hope and trust; and the thrill, the eagerness, excitement, the enthusiasm of just being alive. We also want to feel optimistic about our lives and need and want a sense of well-being. Do we pay attention to the primacy of those needs within ourselves and seek to meet them or do we focus our attention solely on the hit of a response to a text message?

The things we pay attention to are often what we manifest in our lives. So it is useful to inventory and review the things we feed with our attention. The things we feed with our attention often become habituated. Do you feed your hope or your cynicism, for example? Do you feed competitiveness, your jealousies, your grudges, your feelings of being unappreciated? Or do you feed joy and love and friendship and fun?

Attention seeking is also a way to try to staunch the pain, frustration and even despair of loneliness. As connected as we all are, there is a lot of loneliness out there in our world and that loneliness will not be assuaged by surface level connection. The worst loneliness is being lonely in a loving relationship or even when surrounded by friends. I have long referred to it as the howl of loneliness wherein the sense of isolation and alienation and even despair can be so overwhelming that there seems no way out. Many of us have all felt, at one time or another in our lives, that unanswered and unanswerable howl.

I have a column planned on the subject of loneliness as it is a big subject, just as is attention. But one of the surest symptoms of loneliness is becoming consumed with being superficially popular. That driving need to be popular, having lots and lots of superficial friends and acquaintances but none of those relationships having any depth or substance. How many people do you know who make no distinction between acquaintances and real friends? Real friends – the people who will drop everything and be there – good times and bad – when you need and/or want them there. Ask Dickens wrote in Nicholas Nickleby, “Family not only need to consist of merely those whom we share blood, but also for those whom we’d give blood.”

The need for attention and the desire to staunch the howl of loneliness often replaces, for many, the real need of affection. The withdrawal of affection or, even worse, the absence of affection from those we love or care about threatens to leave us lonely and alone. And that loss or absence of affection causes pain, real mental, emotional and spiritual pain. The Dalai Lama said, “We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection.”

We all need affection and that need for genuine affection is something worth paying attention to. Our friends at Oxford Languages via Google say that affection is “a gentle feeling of fondness or liking.” If you look at the many definitions of affection available online, fondness is one of the most common words used in relation to describing what affection is. Merriam-Webster.com also defines affection as, “a feeling of liking and caring for someone or something.” We all want to be liked and cared for and have people feel fond of us. Yes, love is also included in affection but it need not be what we feel to feel affectionate toward someone. “Affectionate attachment” is another term found commonly.

There are all kinds of ways to express or give affection. Physically things like cuddling, holding hands, hugging, etc. Words of affirmation; acts of service; receiving gifts; quality time; and physical touch are commonly associated with ways affection is shown or given. These five things are often associated with what has come to be called the languages of love but they are ways of expressing and receiving affection.

It is an important need. Yet do we pay any attention to giving affection to ourselves or is it always better if someone else gives it to us? How do we give ourselves any affirmation about who we are and what we do and accomplish and who we are becoming? What acts of service do we provide for ourselves or do we tend to treat ourselves in a very utilitarian manner? What do we give of ourselves, to ourselves, like our humor, compassion, intellect, patience? Can we spend quality time alone with ourselves or would we rather chew glass than be alone with ourselves? When was the last time you made yourself laugh because you thought of something funny that only you would understand?

Too often in our current world people substitute and settle for attention, any kind of attention, any port in a storm, rather than seek and cultivate real affection from themselves and from others. Attention, as discussed above, is valuable and essential in our lives but it will not replace the genuine need for affection. Affection, like trust, is something that grows and is earned over time. There is no easy or quick fix to meeting that need. So, by all means, grab all the attention you think or feel you need and want but be careful about thinking it will meet the deeper and more important need of genuine affection.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Dramatic vs. Drama

There is drama and there is being dramatic. Being dramatic is an act of expressing what feel like big emotions. Drama is elevating the trivial or less significant things or events to an inappropriate level of meaning and significance.

Now, admittedly, being dramatic can be fun for both the person being dramatic and the people listening in the sense of dramatization. Think of the people who are great story tellers or great writers. They have a way of elevating the mundane into something compelling and interesting. They are often articulate and very observant and have a way of using their observations to embellish and enrich the stories that they are telling. They often are very funny and in touch with the irony of a situation. A woman I have known for many years has a way of making a trip to the store for tomato paste fascinating. The preparation for the excursion; the trip itself; the process of finding the tomato paste, or not, the people she met in the process, all carefully wrought and expressed in a way that leaves you hungering for more.

Or the writers who can fully imagine a world and its inhabitants and bring them to life in such a way as to make it not only real but they also fully immerse you in the world of their creation. My favorite novelist, Richard Russo, has a brilliant way of tackling tough events and situations and sometimes heart-rending emotions in a way that is unmatched. And, he can also be very funny when it serves his purposes of dramatization.  People like this are to be cherished for their dramatic skills.

Sometimes, being dramatic is a way good way of expressing emotions that feel, at the moment, too big or too overwhelming or too unbelievable or too wonderful. I have been known to go on dramatic rants when I am frustrated with something that makes no sense to me. These rants are often very funny to the people listening and allow me to blow off steam, but they are a rare occurrence and not a daily activity nor my usual way of expressing what I am thinking and feeling. And yes, sometimes being dramatic serves us well in expressing the good stuff sometimes.

Dramatization can play an important role in understanding. People have new ideas and inspirations and goals all the time. But how often do they stop to evaluate if the idea or inspiration or goal is a good idea or achievable or desirable? Do they stop and evaluate the potential outcomes of their thoughts or decisions or actions? And, as you have all experienced, there are times a colleague or friend or loved one just doesn’t see it. You are trying to get them to see what could happen or why this is not a good path to take or it could be harmful to them and you might as well talk to the garage door.

Storytelling, in a sense, can help people to see. By dramatizing what outcomes could be, you are painting a picture. You are telling a story and that often can be very helpful rather than declarations or judgments or even threats. Rather than, “That’s the dumbest damned thing I have ever heard,” or, “You must have lost your mind to think of something that stupid,” or, “If you do that, I’ll . . .” Paint them a picture. Now this can also work well when someone needs encouragement because they are not sure they are ready to take the risk, or they really can’t see how wonderful something could turn out or they just aren’t sure – but you can see it. By bringing it to light through dramatization, if you will, you may help kindle the spark they need for that chance or for that next step to happen.

Drama is a whole different story. OMG. EVERYTHING rises to the same level of earth-shattering importance. Whether it was the butcher at the supermarket seemingly ignoring them or their best friend not listening to them completely, it is all a concern or crisis that must be talked about and processed to death and resolved before they can move on.

Our culture revels in drama. I don’t know about y’all, but because of the whole Brad-Angelina-Jen thing, I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in years. Right? So much of what now drives our popular culture is the constant swirl of drama that surrounds the people who produce that culture. What are the latest details about Britney and her fight with her conservators? Name your celebrity or influencer and there is bound to be controversy somewhere. Why? Because it sells and keeps people’s names in the news, regardless of their art or accomplishments.

We are surrounded by drama. Now, again, admittedly, a lot of the cultural drama is done in the service of monetization of that drama. But beside the few who might profit, for the overwhelming majority of us, all the drama does is leave us hanging on by the final thread of our very last nerve.

Now let’s take this down a notch to the more practical. We have all experienced or know someone who has experienced being caught up in some drama of their own making. At my friend Fred’s workplace, people began leaving. At the time the job market was OK but not great but good enough for people to be able to find jobs. Rather than really delving into the reasons people were leaving this particular workplace, Fred chose instead to focus on the drama going on in the management level just above him as he was also a manager. He spent hours trying to decipher what this person meant when they said or did this or that. Months worrying and not sleeping over the current or possible next daily crisis. And this focus on other people’s drama distracted him from the fact that he had seen the writing on the wall that it was time to leave.

Finally his job was eliminated. He had had several years in which to send out applications, network, interview, etc., but instead focused on trying to control the effect that other people’s drama could have on his livelihood.

Why do people get caught up in drama – either their own or that of others’? Because something has to give our lives meaning and significance. That is a basic human need. What do I mean?

Significance. You go to your mechanic for a long overdue oil change. He or she says that they are too backed up with work and asks you to come back tomorrow or the day after. How significant is that? Well, that would depend on what shape you car is in. If you are down to very low oil level and a filthy filter, it is certainly way more significant than if your vehicle hasn’t reached that point. Is something significant to you? Your partner’s birthday or your anniversary? Some people hate celebrating special events. Other people love to celebrate everything they can. The Black Friday sales. Is it significant to you because that is when you traditionally do your XMAS shopping hoping for the best deals or a you’re one of those people who couldn’t be paid to set foot in a mall on Black Friday?

Meaning. What does something mean to you? You mechanic says to come back in a day or two. Does that mean he is swamped or he hates you and hopes your car falls apart so there is more for him to fix? You are the one who has to remind your partner of significant dates or events. Does that mean they don’t care or their mind just doesn’t work that way? What does something mean to you? Big gestures mean very little to me. An expensive gift or sudden declaration of whatever means a lots less to me than how you treat me on a daily basis. For me the little things mean more and I assign them greater significance.

Who gets to decide what is and is not significant in your life and what the event or problem or happy occasion means to you? You do. And there are no right or wrong answers and you can change your mind at any time. But a clue that you are a drama junkie is giving everything the same level of life-changing significance and meaning. That everything means the same thing and has the same significance – that life as you know it will change – is not only not true but impossible. Practice assigning meaning – what does this really mean to me? Practice assigning significance – yeah it happened but is it really significant? Is it really all that important to me? As you do this, you will find that your life gets a lot easier.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

The Hydra Head of COVID

According to Greek mythology, the Hydra is a nine-headed gigantic water-snake-like monster.  Like the Hydra, there have been many faces to the impact COVID has had on people. For some it has been as traumatic as losing a loved one. For others, outside of being a major inconvenience, it really hasn’t that bad. During these troubling and challenging times, Hercules has not been available to come and rescue us from this monster. We’ve been thrown back onto our own resources to save ourselves.

For people who are more introverted like me, in many ways, it has been an unexpected gift of time. The exile imposed by COVID allowed me time to read, think, meditate, reflect and enjoy the peace that came with the slowing down of the outside world. That said, I was not immune to the fact that life as we all knew it had come to a screeching halt and that all of our heartfelt desires for life to return to return to normal as soon as possible were not going to be answered. And in the course of the last 20 months, my life has changed, and I have changed profoundly in ways that I could neither have foreseen nor imagined.

For the more extroverted among us who thrive on social interaction and get energized by being around others and engaging in out-of-the-house activities, it has been a tough time. Unable to safely and freely move about and be on the go, separated from the touch of friends and loved ones, missing favorite activities, having to find new ways to have fun and connect, has been more difficult. Some have slipped into depression. Others have felt hopeless or helpless or even a sense of despair. Some have gotten very angry. That anger has shown itself in a variety of ways. Angry at politicians. Angry at those who sought to protect themselves by wearing masks. Angry about getting or not getting the vaccines. Angry about others getting or not getting the vaccines. Angry about businesses shutting down. Angry that life as we had known it has gone away.

Life has changed. Many of us would like to say that it was all the result of COVID but many of the changes in our world have been brewing for a long time. In our world, old structures - whether that be media, healthcare, politics, education, international relations, supply chains, alliances, etc. – have and are breaking down and we don’t yet have the new structures to replace the old. In some cases these changes are coming slowly and in other cases coming more rapidly. Some changes are more subtle than others but the old ways, the old traditions of how we thought our world worked or was supposed to work, are breaking down. Order will eventually emerge from the chaos but right now we don’t know what that world will look like and that is bringing up a lot of fear and anxiety and stress in people. COVID added to all that.

Many people felt that they and/or their world was in crisis. The demands made on them - to help stop the spread, to stay home, to give up many of life’s pleasures - were coming too quickly; changes too fast to process; their normal routine, their daily routine had been disrupted and things just weren’t working the way they were supposed to. But we did what we needed to do – we established new routines; processed the changes one step at a time; and we handled the new demands coming from every facet of life as best we could. And this was easier for some than for others. Humans don’t really like change.

Many of us ran into the fact that just because something had worked in the past – job, relationship, hobby, perspectives, goals – did not mean that it would continue to work. Things that we had taken for granted could no longer be taken for granted. Our health, our safety, our survival, our relationships, the things that brought us joy, even our ability to purchase paper towels could no longer be counted on in quite the same way. Spouses and or families having to spend real time together. For some, the increased contact only strengthened the already existing closeness and bonds. Other found themselves looking at loved ones and wondering, “Who are you?”

Many people discovered a desire to not constantly be tied into work and wanting more of a work/life balance. Wanting more flexibility in work schedules. Tired of missing their kids grow up. Quality of life becoming more important than living by arbitrary rules imposed by the workplace. This Hydra-head occasioned the re-prioritizing of life.

Some people found new or alternative or additional ways to make money and survive. Some moved to new places – whether out of choice or by necessity. Many are currently seeking new jobs. That may be for better working conditions, better money, better living conditions or just something new to do as they have become bored and restless.

Having been locked down in our houses for so long, it has been interesting to see people emerge with the drive to be seen and heard. When I was younger, sequins, flashy, sparkly dress was something that was reserved for a very dressy or formal occasion. Now everything glitters, including bedroom shoes – which have moved from the bedroom to everyday footwear. Bling has become de rigueur. Informality in dress and appearance has also become more commonplace. So, in some senses, COVID has changed the way we present ourselves to others as we re-emerge.

COVID also forced people to deal with themselves and then those close to them in ways that they could have avoided before. In the busyness of life, I can keep myself distracted from dealing with me. When I am stuck at home with not a lot to do, eventually binging my fave TV shows, eating, playing with the dog, etc., only will go so far. And then the things like that vague unease you have been feeling starts knocking at the inside of your head. Some people began to rethink what really matters and what is important to them. Others began running into the aspects of themselves that didn’t work for them anymore. Some began to realize how stale their lives had become.

Some began to look at the relationships in their lives and whether they were still important or past their expiration date. The people we cherished and longed for. The touches, the hugs, the warmth of their presence that we so desperately missed but had previously taken for granted. In other cases, people began to get on our nerves – like our spouse or friends who disrupt our equanimity or relatives who we kept in touch with out of a sense of duty and obligation. Nothing was immune from review. In certain cases, we clearly saw what and who we treasured and why, and in other cases, we saw what we had outgrown – people, habits, ways of living our lives.

Others began to dream new dreams and have different hopes and goals. Some went back to school or learned new things from a variety of available resources. Others took on new projects that they had not had the time for before like finally repainting the kitchen or remodeling a room.

We can’t begin to cover all the changes COVID has wrought in the world. COVID, in many senses, made us all realize that we’ve been going with what we know or knew to be good and true and right for us in life, at least up until the pandemic. Nevertheless, for so many of us, it forced us to come face-to-face with – Is this all there is? What now? What’s next? Do I want something more or new or different? Do I deserve more or new or different? Do I dare ask for that? The answer is always, “Yes.”

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Being Liked as a Manipulation

We all need and want to be liked. In being liked we get positive attention from others and that makes us feel valued and worthwhile. It helps us to feel that we are on equal footing with others. It is nice to know that others hold us in high esteem. Nothing sends us over the edge as quickly as when other people ignore us or deem us unworthy of their attention.

In our current Age of Social Media, many of us have become experts in “getting” people to like us. Lots of people openly express the idea that they love social media because you can present yourself as anyone you want to be or pretend to be. Doesn’t matter if that image is real or not. One Gen Z’er I recently spoke to is planning his own You Tube channel wherein he will play a character that is not himself but in so presenting this character, he hopes to gain a following and he tells me that lots of people do this. You get liked and you get followed and, hopefully, you eventually find a way to monetize your presentation and make money presenting yourself as someone else.

As a form of programming or publishing, I think that this is basically no different than an author presenting new characters in books or likeable characters in movies or television. The problem here is that these people are not real. So, in presenting yourself as someone you are not, you are still not being liked for who you actually are and you have to keep up the artifice or face significant backlash from your online community. But, for a group of our compatriots, this level and fashion of being liked may be fine, at least for a while. But it still is a paper-thin level of being liked and accepted, and what happens if and when your 15 minutes is over?

All of that said, that discussion is for another time. What I want to talk about here is about the people who in “real life,” whether that is in the workplace or with friends or family, manipulate you into liking them so they can get what they want out of the relationship - but nothing of value or mattering comes back from them. These are usually people who are, on the surface, very likeable people. They are most often very talkative and personable and almost constantly in motion, at least when you are watching. But they are also, underneath all of the collegiality and bonhomie, getting away with murder.

Some examples. Let’s start with work. Years ago, I bartended with a nice enough looking young guy who used his looks to get in good with our female manager. She walked it right up to the line in giving him preferred shifts and scheduling but not enough for anyone to accuse her of favoritism. Problem was that he wasn’t that good a bartender and didn’t really want to work that hard. What he was willing to work hard at was getting what he wanted from his manager and maintained a passable level of civility with the rest of his co-workers.

He certainly never went above or beyond for anything or anybody. One day his manager had to call him out about something that needed correction and she did it in front of other staff. It was procedural and the correction could have applied to any of us and was thus more of a reminder to all in hearing distance than it was a personal attack on him. He escalated the argument, attacking her and it went back and forth until he said something nasty to her and she announced, in front of the other staff, that he was a “lousy fuck.” Needless to say, neither his nor her employment lasted much longer at this particular establishment. But he had gotten what he wanted for as long as he could until it was time to move on.

How about the person in the office who is always fun and friendly and willing to briefly help others but never gets their own work done? They talk a great game. They suck up to management, who think them delightful. They get the scheduling they want. They get the time off they want. Senior management is always stopping to talk with them. Sometimes they even get to flout the dress code when no one else does. They often talk and talk and talk constantly and the rest of the staff likes them until they begin to realize that they never complete anything and, in many cases, never start anything they really don’t want to do. But they get away with it because they’re always so busy, busy, busy with everything and everyone else that for a while they can make it look like they are working themself to death. One particular woman was busy having fun with her co-workers and drinking on the job. She was popular, and on occasion did do enough work that she could show some accomplishments. But over time, people began to realize she was hardly ever at her desk. She was here and there and yon but rarely ever actually applying herself to her actual work. But they liked her.

A similar version of this was a young guy who was also a big talker. Talked mostly about himself and what he was doing and his exploits way from work, as did the lady above. But when he was unable to avoid a work task, he would do it but at a plodding snail’s pace. Regardless of the complexity of the task, it was done at a pace that was just above glacial. Usually someone would step in and help or take it over for him as otherwise he would never be finished. He often resented being told what to do and made no bones talking badly about managers who made demands on him, making sure that we knew he thought they are all assholes and not to be trusted. But he was well liked by staff and management and he moved on just as soon as more was expected of him. But until then, he got whatever he wanted and never did anything he didn’t want to do or could get out of because he got people to like him.

The point in these examples is that sooner or later people will see through the artifice. As the old saying goes, you can fool some of the people some of the time but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time. Eventually people will see through the constant talking, all the busy activity that accomplishes nothing and will also begin to resent the sucking up to those who they think can do them some good.  So, it goes with the friends or family from whom they take and take and give nothing back. You can’t help liking them until you get tired of being manipulated into giving them what they want, but when you actually need them, they are nowhere to be found. And the best part is that, in whatever circumstance, when you or someone else finally has had enough and says no to them, they feel a self-righteous sense of betrayal and abandonment. But when you finally say no it is because you are so tired of the constant barrage of talk that actually says nothing substantial and activity used to camouflage who they really are and what they really are about, that you feel nothing but relief.

Whether online as a persona in cyber space or in the actual living of life out among the other humans, people will watch you and figure out who you really are through your behavior. Behavior doesn’t lie. Why? Because, in general, people wind up doing the things they really want to do and they don’t do or procrastinate until the end of time the things they don’t really want to do, regardless of what they say. As charming or fun or personable or interesting as someone may present themselves to be, the truth will out as to whether there is any real substance there.

Playwright and poet Ben Jonson was named England's first ever Poet Laureate in 1616. (Wikipedia) He wrote, "True happiness Consists not in the multitude of friends, But in the worth and choice." Who you choose to be and become will reflect and express your true worth to yourself. And others will see whether there is someone of depth and consequence there through your actions and behavior, regardless of what comes out of your mouth and regardless of all the activity you use to distract others from seeing the truth of your being. Make good choices as to who you are as it will raise your value and worth to others and, most especially, to yourself. And it will spare you a lot of tap dancing.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Dignity

Dignity is valuing yourself and valuing others. If you do a Google search, it will tell you that it means being valued and respected for what you are, what you believe in, and how you live your life. It means treating others the way we'd like to be treated ourselves – which is basically the Golden Rule of “do unto others . . .”

Dignity has several components. Value is primary but dignity also includes character and integrity; your personal framework of memory and myth; your personal dreams and visions; and freedom. In our current world, too many are seeking to strip others of their dignity and that is a contributing factor in the breakdown of civility and communication in our society. We often won’t take the time to talk with, much less understand, those who we have deemed unworthy of being valued and respected for who they are, what they believe in, and how they live their lives.

 In other blog posts we have talked a great deal about valuing ourselves and others. It begins with self-awareness - knowing our needs, wants, desires, hopes, dreams, goals, beliefs, the choices we make and why, and more. And while the hopes, dreams, needs, wants, of others are more than likely are very different than ours, it doesn’t make those things any less valuable. When you deny or dismiss the value those things, you strip away some dignity.

Beyond self-awareness, value also includes self-confidence and self-self-love. Self-confidence is knowing that you can cope with whatever life throws at you – both good and bad. We all have different coping mechanisms and different ways of evaluating whether we feel prepared to cope with life. We are all impacted by different things in our own unique way. What may be devastating to one of us might just roll off the back of others of us. What we cannot do is undermine peoples’ coping mechanisms by insisting that they see things or react or deal with things in the way we think they should or as we would. Doing so would undermine their sense of self-confidence.

Self-love is also part of value. When we learn to love ourselves, we are more likely to recognize our own value and, thus, the value of others and the value of the loving relationships they have in their lives.

We won’t go into self-respect here as there is an entire blog post and podcast devoted to that subject that is available to you.

When we deny or refuse to see and respect the needs, wants, desires, hopes, dreams, goals, beliefs, choices, self-respect, self-love and self-confidence, in others, we are stripping them of dignity. And that is not OK.

Character is an important part of dignity. Character and integrity go together. As we discussed when we talked about authenticity, character is about living by our ideals and principles like honesty, compassion, caring, morals, ethics, being responsible, never deliberately being hurtful to others, etc. The measure of our character is how often and how successfully we live by our principles. Integrity is doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do, even when no one is looking. Integrity is keeping our word and keeping our commitments.

When we disparage or disregard or harshly judge the character and integrity of people we know nothing about, we are blinding ourselves to their dignity. We cannot make any kind of value judgment about the character and integrity of anyone based on their appearance or gossip we have heard about them, much less based on some assumption that we have made about them. When we treat others from a place wherein we are not living by our own character and integrity or when we make negative assumptions about anyone’s character or integrity, we turn our backs on dignity.

Also, we all have our own framework of memory and myths. Even if you and I and a friend of ours all went to the same concert or party, all three of us would remember the event differently. We would certainly all remember some of the same things but there would be no absolutely correct version of our memories. So it goes with all of us. Often we remember things from our childhood differently than our parents. A big shock for many as an adult is when they find out that a memory that they have held onto since childhood that was a defining moment for them, their parents have no recall of it ever happening. My point is we all have a storehouse of memories that shape and mold us – our perceptions, our perspectives, our ways of coming at the world and our ways of being in the world. And, over time, we let go of some memories and replace them with newer and more important memories – both good and bad. But everyone’s storehouse of memory is exclusive only to them. We don’t get to judge their memories. We only get to try to understand them and the impact they have had or continue to have. And refusing to respect that the memories that have shaped someone else, that are more than likely very different from your lived experience, cheats them of respect and dignity.

Further, we all have our own personal framework of myths. Most people think of myths as nice stories like fairy tales. Myths are stories but not fairy tales and certainly not fiction. Myths have been used throughout history to explain where we came from, how we got here, and the origin of our people or tribe, our customs, our beliefs, our rituals as a society or as a people. Myths are also instructional. They explain how to approach life or make it through life in a variety of situations. They are archetypal in that sense. This or that myth explains how we should do this or get through that challenge in life or how to make good decisions or do the right thing. Many are about how to avoid the traps that life can set for us.

We all have a set of stories that we tell ourselves about the ways the world works and about how life works and about how we have to approach life and the people in it. Those myths that we live by are informed by the memories we hold, the experiences we have, as well as the beliefs we have come to trust. This is the way life or relationships work and that is just the way it is for us, at least until we decide to change. This is why, as the old wise saying goes, “You can’t understand someone until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes.” You have no idea of the memories and personal myths that have come to form them as they are because those experiences and memories and strategies of getting through life are so personal and so singular to each and every one of us.

We all also have our own dreams and visions for our life. The things we want to accomplish and experience. Where we see ourselves as our life progresses. The life we want to live. And freedom is about the freedom to be and become whomever we want to be, unencumbered by the judgments or obstacles placed on our path by others.

When you encounter someone who doesn’t think like you, look like you, dress like you, worship like you, eat the same things you do, like the same music or movies that you do, remember it is their personal value made up of self-awareness, self-love, self-confidence, self-respect; their character and integrity, their myths and memories; their dreams and visions for their own lives; and their God-given freedom to be and become whomever they want; that has produced the person you are encountering. You do not get to judge them or their process. As we said above, dignity is about treating others the way we'd like to be treated ourselves and nobody likes being judged unfairly or deemed less than others.

There are a lot of problems in the world right now and to begin to fix them, we are going to need all hands on deck. And in order for us to do that we are going to need to begin respecting and honoring one another’s inherent dignity. No, not everybody is going to be just like you nor should they be. A society of the Borg would be a horrible place to live. But as we once again learn to and practice respecting and honoring one another’s inherent dignity, the good news is you are going to meet some amazing people along the way. And as we learn to work together, so will come quite literally, our salvation.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc

Self-Respect

An edited version of Self-Respect was published in the Georgia Voice paper and website on 7/23/2021: thegavoice.com

Photo 213490420 © Kukurund | Dreamstime.com

I don’t usually eavesdrop on conversations. That said, when someone is talking loud enough for me to hear, it’s on them. Right? So I am listening to this guy tell a friend that as he is now in his 50s, he has recently discovered self-respect and having done so, has put his wife and his twenty-something aged kids on notice that if they dare to disrespect him, they are all going to be sorry. He isn’t going to take it anymore. But wait, there’s more.

Not only is his family now on notice, but he isn’t taking it from anybody else either. So he finds himself on a surface street that is being blocked by two cars, one headed in one direction and one headed in another and they are having a conversation. When the one headed in the opposite direction of him moves, he drives around the person that has been blocking him, yelling something out the window at the driver. Then the driver catches up to him and starts yelling at him. This goes on with them now chasing one another so that the last person that got yelled at can yell back and get the last word. It escalates with an open water bottle being thrown back and forth between cars and then eventually an opened canned soda being thrown back and forth between the two cars.

The story teller eventually chases this other car into a cul-de-sac where they are both stopped with the cars facing one another. The yelling continues until the passenger in the other car gets out and pulls a gun on the guy telling the story, who then backs his car out of the cul-de-sac and goes home. But he feels vindicated, even though he almost got himself shot, because he wasn’t going to put up with being disrespected.

Respect is not something you can demand any more than you can demand that someone trust you. Respect, like trust, is earned. First from self and then from others. It is not unlike understanding. If you want people to understand you, you must first seek to be understanding of others. “Oh, no. They better ‘get’ that they need to understand/trust/respect me first.” Good luck with that. People that can’t or won’t treat others with respect, as clichéd as it sounds, usually have no idea what respect means or they don’t respect themselves.

So, where to start? Step one is to honestly and appropriately express all of your emotions. Back in March I wrote a blog post entitled, “Feelings, Wo-O-O Feelings,” about dealing with feelings so I am not going to belabor this now. However, first you have to be able to correctly identify what you are feeling. Are you angry or are you sad? Are you happy or just content? Are you really hurt or just disappointed? Once you have identified what you are feeling, then express it appropriately. If I am angry or confused, let’s say, sometimes just the admission of that can help clear it. If I acknowledge I am angry with myself or someone else, or, if I am confused about something or you are confusing me, then I can do something about it. And I will earn respect from myself for having identified the feeling and moved beyond it. But if I scream and holler at you because I am angry at you or I punish myself because I am angry with me, I am inflicting pain by my inappropriate expression and there is no basis there for earning respect from myself.

Further, too many people, like our friend above, get the idea in their heads that “out of self-respect, I get to tell you what a no good, dirty rotten, low down Communist I really think you are.” That isn’t acting out of self-respect. That is acting out of judgment and ego. Far better to just walk away from behavior you find offensive or inappropriate.

So it goes with positive emotions like love. Famed Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca wrote, “To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.” Or suppose you are proud of yourself or someone else and instead of expressing that pride, you give them or yourself some kind of left-handed compliment or say something snarky instead. There will be no foundation on which to build self-respect. When you can appropriately express of your feelings, your estimation of yourself will rise.

Secondly, when you fail at something or fall short of your goal, stop and figure out what went wrong. Why did you not succeed as you had intended? Do not blame anybody or anything else. You can‘t fix what you won’t be responsible for. Whether it is a work project, a hobby, or a relationship, whatever the nature of that relationship, when something goes awry or doesn’t work or falls apart, look for what happened. Could it have been avoided? What decisions, actions, choices, beliefs, etc., led you to where things are now? And own and admit that you contributed to this outcome.

Now, a lot of us grew up with the idea that if we made a mistake, not only do we feel terrible about having done so, but we were supposed to be punished for it. No. I learned many years ago that when you hold up you hand, say, “Yeah, I did it,” and be responsible, people will break their backs to help you correct whatever went wrong. And you and others will respect that.

But what about when things go right, go well? How did you get here? What decisions, actions, choices, commitment, perseverance, got you here across the finish line? Own that. Not out of ego. Succeeding doesn’t make you better than. But it is important to figure out and know how you succeeded. Why? So you can do it again. ‘”It was just luck.” Really? Honor the process you used to succeed so that you can replicate, usually with adjustments for the situation, additional successes and greater successes. That you can and will respect.

And finally, always – always – operate from a place of integrity and character, meaning that the ends never ever justify the means. It is always about how you got there. The process. The steps taken. How you conducted yourself along the way, on a daily basis. Were you honest or did you manipulate others? Did you cut corners or did you make sure that the quality of work or product was not sacrificed in the name of expediency? Did you build bridges to others or did you burn bridges in your quest to be first? Did you seek to be understanding and compassionate of self and others or were you impatient, condescending and rude as you progressed? My personal yardstick has long been if I can look into my own eyes in the bathroom mirror at the end of the day and feel good about me, that is all that matters.

Life is a process in the big picture, and so are all of our days, in the little, immediate picture. No one is saying we have to be perfect. Clearly not. But process is the means to our ends and how, on a daily basis, we get to where we are going, is one of the surest ways we can and will learn to respect ourselves.  And, rather than risking getting ourselves shot in a dark cul-da-sac, we will be able to respect that maybe someone else was just having a bad day.

© 2021   Living Skills, Inc. All rights reserved in all media

Living Skills offers positive psychology counseling, spiritual counseling, and life coaching services in Atlanta, and online. We are sensitive to the needs of the LGBT community. Sessions available by Skype. Please email us at livingskillsinc@gmail.com or visit www.livingskills.pro. Podcast: “The Problem with Humans” now available on Apple Podcasts, Buzzsprout, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, and Spotify, Overcast, Castro, Castbox, and Podfriend, as well as on my site. Follow us on Twitter - @livingskillsinc