We get what we anticipate…

I like to draw on other aspects of my life to teach myself lessons. Being able to show my inner 5 year old “why” or “how” is often more effective for me than trying to convince my inner teenager to “eat my emotional vegetables”. The inner adult in me is not really part of this equation, she frequently throws up her hands and leaves the room due to her frustration of having to “have this conversation again”.

So the other day I had an epiphany…I am getting from others, and situations, what I am expecting – I’m telegraphing. Here are 2 non-human examples that “prove” my theory.

I ride horses. I’m a nervous/anxious person with a desire to control things to minimize risk. Horses take their cues from the “lead mare” and the herd. When you’re a rider, your job is to demonstrate to the horse that all is well. If the horse has spooked (jumped out from under you for non-horse people) in a particular spot, or in response to a trigger (baby carriage) then when you see a baby carriage you tense up. Your body telegraphs fear. The horse doesn’t rationalize, “oh, it’s a baby carriage, last time I saw one one of those I lost my sh*t and dumped my rider” – instead the horse feels your anxiety and thinks “clearly we’re about to die” and spooks (jumps out from under you). Our trainer has told us many times “your horse is spooking there because you’re expecting it’. We all roll our eyes and complain about our silly horse – but when we can let go of fear/anxiety and actually just ride on – the horse will too. Not a horse person, how about dogs?

The other day I was walking with a friend and her very sweet, docile, somewhat jumpy rescue dog. As the 3 of us were happily wandering along we saw a French bulldog. Apparently her dog HATES Frenchies and as we were walking towards the “threat” she decided she’d try to not prepare for the inevitable Cujoifcaion (yes, Stephen King reference) of her lapdog. As she and I kept chatting and stopped to coo over the baby (the French was only 7 months old) her little dog joined in the discussion, happily sniffing behinds and saying hello in his doggie way. No anticipation, no Cujoifcaion.

Okay, now for some human evidence. There’s a recipe for conflict in my house. My retired husband is unsuspectingly spending his time as he chooses (lately online poker – hey, it’s Corona lock down folks, we’re all making due) and having a beer. I’m working all day (’cause I’m not retired) and when I emerge at 5ish I’m annoyed about my day, ready for my beer (well, wine) and don’t want to be asked “what’s for dinner”. Then, because I’m peevish he’s like “what’s your problem” and now we’re squabbling. Not having a commute home to offload the debris of the work day can be a challenge. So, lately what I’ve been doing is anticipating this little tete-a-tete and we get to it even faster. The other day I realized I was spooking my horse (don’t tell him I compared him to my horse, he hates that) and decided I’d approach it differently. I created a commute (hid in the bathroom) shifted my own irritability and came out in a good mood. Guess what – that’s what I got back!

Well. With that success I tried a harder experiment. My husband is kind of cheating, he likes me (most of the time). So – work colleagues! On a meeting for a project that we’re all “over” and feeling cranky and blames about. Same outcome! By not anticipating conflict and preparing for it, I didn’t get it.

If you need more convincing, check out this excerpt from a WSJ opinion piece:  Worried About a Difficult Conversation? Here’s Advice From a Hostage Negotiator.

“How should you prepare for a difficult conversation? Mr. Voss: We often prepare but don’t realize it. When we think about the conversation, we picture ourselves getting mad. That is preparation. And we default to our highest level of preparation. So if that is all you prepared for, that is what you are going to get.”

We get what we prepare for, what we anticipate!

Okay, I think you’ve got the concept. So – what do you telegraph? Where are you “getting what you expect”. How do you want to change that?

I’d love to hear about your experiences 🙂

 

 

We aren’t giving guys enough credit

I confess this title/thought struck me as I was thinking about an episode of Southern charm New Orleans – a reality show that I occasionally treat myself to …so with that knock against my credibility here are the two scenes that trigged this thought.

Scene one – a couple that had been married for around 15 years are out for dinner and he comments “oh, right over there is where we got married” and she says “Wow! You remember” – with that little teasing edge we can have. He looks at her with surprise, “of course I remember where we got married”. He genuinely seemed hurt that she thought he would have forgotten.

Scene two – recently divorced couple meeting for coffee. She tells him that she’s engaged to marry the man she’s now dating. It’s clear that he’s really bowled over by the news – even without the reality show trick of the camera panning away to get his behind the scenes narration where he explains how much it effected him.

When she goes home and tells her fiancé that she told her ex, the fiancé asks “how did he take it? Did he seem upset or hurt? and she said “oh no, he’s totally fine”. Now some would say her lack of awareness about his feelings is partly why they divorced, but  I believe it’s also that “men don’t hurt” mindset that we’ve all been indoctrinated to believe.  That’s even what her ex-husband said “who wants to show heartbreak?”.

Why do we (women in general and the larger, societal we) assume men are not sentimental? We label that stuff “chicky” and then wonder why they don’t show emotion, we get mad at them when they don’t remember and mock them if they do.

With men (and to be fair, probably people in general) if they don’t respond to things the way we respond to things we assume they are experiencing different feelings.

I don’t think we’re giving guys enough credit, and I believe this does a disservice to guys and to all of us too because we miss those good moments, those deep connections.   I grew up in “cowboy country” and most male emotions were handled by whiskey and fist fights, or total withdrawal (yes, to be fair over simplification, but I’m talking about a general theme so work with me 🙂 ) Remember, male withdrawal often doesn’t look like “well, if that’s what you think, I”m leaving”. In cowboy country, and I’m sure many urban locales, this looks like going to do chores – for example – my grandfather literally responded to my Mom once with “I’m going to go check the cows” – and he was a lovely man, just not super emotive and my Mom at that moment was VERY emotive…he bailed 🙂

My Dad was a pretty “in touch guy”; to the point that he was bullied a lot as a kid for not being tough enough and even he didn’t really open up. I didn’t really notice that about him until I was an adult, and to some degree, until I was writing this but he too was a “going to check the cows” kinda guy. Later in life he was often vulnerable with me, but not as much with his wife and I’m sure not as much with my Mom either.

Just like most of us, I carry these assumptions about men not having the depth of feeling we do. I don’t give husband enough credit for the complexity of his thoughts and emotions (he’d totally be rolling his eyes right now) but I don’t and that’s why I’m writing this – I think we, women, put men in boxes. You know, the ones we complain about being in? And I believe we’ll have more fulfilling relationships, romantic and otherwise, if we challenge our assumptions.

For another point of view on all of this (other than my reality TV addiction) consider this blog post (Why Men Withdraw Emotionally.). The writer points out that even he who was raised by a Mom who was sharing concepts of openness and emotion intelligence, there are certain events that cause him to withdraw. He points out that men are not “allowed the space to feel, or express feelings” and goes on to remind us that woman grow up being allowed to have are range of emotions, and we learn how to identity them in ourselves. I love this statement “Men don’t fall short in the emotional realm because we are emotionally immature. We are emotionally inexperienced.“

I know that many of us are trying to navigate relationships and we get so much stuff that’s about being on opposite sides, even when it’s well intentioned – remember “Men are From Mars, Women are From Venus”? It had some good points, but at it’s core “you’re alien to one another”. I believe we have more in common than we often realize, and a big part of why we have misscommuncations is we because we make assumptions – we don’t believe that men experience the same sentiment we do and so we discount them.

Granted, this post started because I saw two dudes get blown off on a reality show, but at it’s core it’s about recognizing that just because its not how I’d express it doesn’t mean the feeling isn’t real. I can think of so many examples where my husband has demonstrated depth of caring that if I’m not careful I brush right past.

It’s Father’s Day, let’s give guys more credit and see where that takes us 🙂

 

Your best is good enough

My whole life I’ve been overly focused on “doing things right”. It took me a long time to realize that I had perfectionist tendencies, because in my mind, perfectionists got things right – and I seldom got things right, so clearly I wasn’t a perfectionist.

Initially that intensity served me well. The career I’d landed in, technical project management, is full of detail oriented perfectionists. Having a list and checking it twice is nirvana for every uber-organized micromanager! Being a good PM meant being given more projects and being able to manage multiple projects at once means you have to get good at knowing when 110% is needed and when 80% is good enough.

For a perfectionist this is a completely foreign concept. You don’t deliver different levels of quality based on need, you just work harder. That worked pretty well for awhile, then I had to project that took 12 hour days at my computer and was causing back spasms. I ignored them thinking, “oh well, just have to get through this, then I’ll bounce back”. Did you know that it’s possible to do permanent soft tissue damage to your back? I didn’t know that. I do now 😐

It also turns out that blocking out pain is incredibly mentally draining so it was taking more and more effort (therefore time at my computer) to produce even 95%, which made the back spasms worse…oh, and when I’m uncomfortable, I’m SUPER cranky. So I was in pain, irritable and not fun to be around… The project was done but at 35 I was very worried that so was I.

Financial stability was a big reason I worked so hard (in other words, what drove my perfectionism) and I was really scared that I would not be able to keep working on a computer, and so had no idea how I would continue to make a living.

I started working with a physical therapist and chiropractor.  It took about 4 months but they got me to the point where I could work, drive more than 20 minutes and generally function.

After the fog cleared a few things became apparent.

1. No one had “done this to me”; I done it to myself by not listening to my body and prioritizing my health
2. I did not actually have some sort of early onset dementia – I’d just been in pain. Once I felt better my short term memory (which had always been remarkably good) came back, I could think on my feet again, I could follow complicated design meetings.
3. To not wind up in that position again I had to shitft my mindset on “good enough”.

A few things changed after that, one big one was I was given larger projects where I was leading other PMs, something I’d always wanted to do. This lead to a new challenge for my inner perfectionist. I couldn’t do it all, I had to let others do it too, and they way they did it was often not the way I’d do it. Now when my boss asked “what happened on X, Y, or Z” I had to answer for someone else’s work, and if it wasn’t good enough when I did it, you can bet it wasn’t good enough when someone else did it.

I was tough, expecting others to work as hard I as did and be as concerned as I was with dotting every I and crossing every T. I made things very difficult for me and several other people. I hurt people’s feelings and didn’t listen to their point of view. I was so, so lucky to work with several amazingly talented and kind people who forgave me when I was jerk (many times over), patiently waited for me to realize when I was in the wrong and still continued to do top notch work. I’m deeply grateful for their support because those big projects were successful and lead to more opportunities.

Then I moved from a PM role to a role managing a team, and once again really had to adjust to the idea that I couldn’t “control” the outcome. I had all these personalities, who knew far more about the work to be done than I did, so not only did they not do things the way I would do them; I COULDN’T do what they did!

Somewhere along the line I started caring more about the person than the outcome. I learned that all these smart, hardworking people were going to get it done. Maybe not the way I would (which often was a good thing, their way was frequently better than mine) but they were going to absolutely do their very best. And I learned that a whole lot of those folks also were beating themselves up about “getting it right” – and my perfectionism was making it worse for us all.

So, I started coming up with little phases that helped me remember your best is good enough.

Here are a few:

• Know when 80% is all that’s needed.
• NMJ – Not my job (stop taking over other people’s stuff!! it undermines them and means you don’t have time to do what is your job!)
• Do your best, forget the rest. If you’re stuck on the 80% thing, or for some other reason are beating yourself up – stop, think about it. Did you truly do your best? If so, let it go. 
• Everyone else’s job looks easy, so does yours. Cut yourself, and the rest of the world some slack.
• Just because you don’t do it like I would, doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong.
• Know your own red-line (like a car engine). One person’s baseline is 45 hours a week, another’s is 50. If you’re redlining, only you know and when you impload it’s worse for everyone.

Do your best! As time goes by your best will get better, everyone’s does as we develop expertise, and you will be more confident. Evaluate more things based on effort vs outcome. Be more forgiving of yourself and others.

And, to quote a friend’s Grandmother “above all else, never lose your sense of humor” 🙂

Okay, on that note, this post is “good enough”. Yes, it’s “late” (by my rule) and I didn’t proof as well as I’d like, but it’s at least 80% – and it will serve it’s purpose.

Sit through the discomfort

As pleasers the hardest thing to do can be doing nothing. This is so hard for me and it has affected my relationships (friends, family, romantic, work), my career, my health – there’s no aspect of my life that has not been impacted by my instinctive need to “help”, which really translates to “like me, love me” – the core driver for any pleaser.

I think this trait is more common than we believe. I’ve done a quick search using terms such as “% population people pleasers” and didn’t find any data,  but there’s the usual plethora of articles and essays (like this one! Ha 🙂 )

There was one article I found, on the US Army site of all places (good for them!), that says “Some estimates suggest that over 90 percent of the American population demonstrates codependent behavior. A study by Crester and Lombardo (1999) found that nearly half of surveyed college students displayed middle or high codependent characteristics.”  The article mentions how hard it is to find quantifiable data and suggests that one reason is the varied definitions and also talks about low level vs high level. That’s where my thinking was going as well. I think we all have the “pleaser” trait to some degree and it can vary based on mood, energy level, type of interaction etc…

To me this is all relevant because a big part of the drive to please (for me at least) is wanting to be accepted and finding “evidence” that I’m not really much weirder than anyone else boosts my spirits, anyway back to the topic at hand. Sitting through the internal pressure of not pleasing.

Recently I was having a conversation with a co-worker about my frustration around people thinking I was accountable for something that from my point view (and my job description) I was not the owner of. As we were talking I realized a big part of what had occurred is I’d set the expectation that I was taking the work on. Being on conference calls where people are talking about something that needs to be done and a bunch of vagary about who’s doing it makes me nuts and that little ball of tension grows in my belly and I wind up saying (sometimes snapping) “oh, fine, I’ll do it” – then I’m ticked off when everyone expects me to do something that’s not my job. I’ve had similar conversations with friends and my husband has more than once told me to “stop “helping” me – if I want your help, I”ll ask” (that message is usually fairly gruff because by that point he’s tired of my interference). And yes, there are plenty of legitimate times to offer help, but a key point is OFFER, not just do.

As I’m writing this and doing a little fact/sanity checking I’m reminded of the book Codependent No More, Melody Beattie. I first came across it in the early 90’s and didn’t really read it. Now that I’m looking at it a little more closely, I think it may need to get squeezed onto the Kindle shelf for a read in between murder mysteries 🙂 but for now I’ve cribbed a few bullets from sites where other people have read it.

• Do you feel responsible for other people–their feelings, thoughts, actions, choices, wants, needs, well-being and destiny?
• Do you feel insecure and guilty when someone gives to you?

And this one:

• Do you feel compelled to help people solve their problems or by trying to take care of their feelings?

Yes! That’s what really clicked for me the other day – the realization that the tight feeling in my stomach that pushes me to “help” is actually probably a good reminder to STOP helping”.  And interestingly enough – several of the things I’ve read tonight point out that   codependents (pleasers, whatever we want to label “this”) are often compelled to act, they feel it’s not in their control.

So – given that for me this whole blogging exercise is about tools and “nuggets” – my personal nugget is now that I’ve linked that tension / compulsion to act my inner-pleaser it means I may have found my “tell” (you know the term for when a poker player is bluffing 😉 ) – a way to catch myself when I’m falling into that pattern. I’ve been practicing since I had that realization and I’ll find myself feeling that tension and mentally telling myself not to step in. Early days still but I have noticed a difference at home and at work I’m actually getting support from my boss, he’s agreeing with me when I stay out of the fray. It’s really uncomfortable! Sometimes I have to find something else to do in order to keep myself quiet, but I can tell that it’s going to pay off.

Now, here’s the challenge, what’s your tell? Rather than a list of 10 things to fix, pick one – that you can recognize a signal for, and start working on that one. Good luck, and if you find a “tell” stop by and share it – it might be useful!