Negative and Positive Feedback Loops

While there are many things that contribute to a sense on strain in relationships, one of the highest ranking is the feeling of not being appreciated and acknowledged.  With the busyness of life and our many obligations it is easy to fall into habits that may not make us happy, but allow us to survive day to day.  Getting by is not enough for most people, nor should it be.  We want to feel inspired, connected, engaged, and loved.  One way to put energy back into a relationship system that has been under strain is to start remembering and noticing the things your partner, friend, family member, or child does that you appreciate and to letting them know.  Relationships get stuck in feedback loops.  Defensiveness, irritability, and aggression sustain negative and unfulfilling feedback loops.  We do not have to settle for this.  We can do our part to create positive feedback loops by being decent, kind, patient, and acknowledging and appreciating the positive things people are already doing.  The equation is relatively simple.  To have better relationship do less negative, and damaging things (e.g. acting aggressively, impatiently, stubbornly, defensively, and dismissively), and do more positive things (e.g. showing appreciation, love, understanding, patience, thoughtfulness, listening, and care).  We have a choice of which feedback loops we participate in. I recommend declining invitations to participate in negative feedback loops, and inviting others to participate in positive feedback loops.

Getting on the Same Page

Conflict often happens in the details especially in parenting decisions.  We forget that in all likelihood what we want for our children is on the same page with our partner.  That is, we want our children to feel loved and safe and we want them to develop in a healthy way.  With the busyness and demands of life with children, work, sleep deprivation, and the often depleted appreciation bank, it is easy to be less than our best selves.  To be short with our partners, harsh, or defensive all these bad communication habits are not conducive to solving problems or collaborative decision making.  If you find yourself stuck with your partner in habits that are not working you do not have to stay stuck.  There two steps that can help to get on the same page.  The first is owning our behaviors that are inhibiting the process of working as a team (e.g. being defensive, aggressive, disrespectful, etc.) and consciously making efforts to work as a team.  The second is taking a step back to remember and to remind each other of the large unified goals you have together as parents.

Language of Possibility

The language we use with ourselves and with each other strongly effects how we feel.  When clients use the words “always” and “never” in a session to talk about themselves or their partners it is red flag for me signifying an area in which they are stuck.  It important to remember problems occur in time.  That is, there was a time before the current problem (or sense of being stuck) and there will be a time after it.  Additionally, the use of absolute language such as “always” and “never” rejects the idea that it is possible to change.  The story that is being told using “always” or “never” is just the one that is getting the most attention and causing the most frustration.  It is not the only story.  When we search our minds there are exceptions; times when we or our partner did not do whatever it is we are accusing them or ourselves of “always” or “never” doing.  Even if there are no exceptions in the past change is possible if people seek change.  Things can be done differently in the present and the future.  I strongly believe that as long as people are alive they can change, if change is what they seek.   A simple way to begin is to be aware of the use of absolute language and to try to use more of a language of possibility.  For example, instead of saying, “I can’t ______,” one could say, “I have not yet_____,” or “I find it very difficult to _______.”  We need not limit the stories we live and are creating through static language, when can speak and live a language of change and possibility.

Guilt and Forgiveness

Martin Buber tells a story in Tales of the Hasidim, in which a man goes to a Rabbi and asks, “In this age in which there are no prophets how do we know when our sins are forgiven?”  The Rabbi answers, “We stop committing them.” I find this an incredibly powerful story for addressing guilt.  As I have written many times people are creatures of habit and we generally do not change our patterns until they causes us so much pain that we must.  Our pain tells us something is wrong and we need to do something differently.  It’s evolutionary. We can learn from our pain to stop hurting ourselves and others.  Learning and changing is the gift of forgiveness that Buber addresses in this story.  When we pay attention to the pain we experience and the pain we cause others we are in position stop these ways of acting and being.  We need not continue to suffer and cause suffering once our pain or another’s has awakened us up to habits we are engaging in that are causing the suffering.  In being aware we can turn off autopilot of habit and consciously and intentionally make choices that make life better.

The Most Dangerous Idea

Émile Auguste Chartier writes (in French), “Nothing is more dangerous than an idea, when it's the only one we have.” What seems to trap us is our perspective, dogmas, and rigidity.  We forget the strange old expression that “there is more than one way to skin a cat.”  By limiting our creativity and perspective we limit our ability to solve problems (be it cat skinning or any other project).  We have the creativity and intelligence to solve our problems once we see that it is our attachment doing things the same way (even when it is no longer working) that is keeping us trapped.  There is always another way of solving a problem.  If you feel trapped try to take a step back to observe the habit or pattern.  Then try something different.  You know the results doing things the same way.  Any positive effort is a step in the right direction and the beginning of the change you seek.

Slow Down!

Too often we get ourselves in positions we regret as the result of rushing or responding with a disproportionate sense of urgency.  Most of us who are not doctors or emergency medical techincians are not making decisions that are matters of life and death.  When we get upset and our heart rate gets up our primal brain thinks we are in fact in a life threatening situation.  Responses from this state of mind are fight or flight; what is said and done is done with aggression and/or fear.   Our fight or flight instincts that helped us survive as cavemen and keep us from getting hit by cabs unfortunately do not help us to be understood or develop the relationships we desire.  Allowing ourselves to be understood requires that we take the time and space we need to become calm and clear.  When we are calm and clear we can discuss our feeling and needs in way that is respectful and constructive to our relationships.  Understanding does not happen through force, aggression, or avoidance.  It is invited when we create a sense of safety by demonstrating calmness, clarity, patience and a respectful desire to be understood and understand one another.

Staying in Character

Don’t be mean (i.e., yelling, cursing, nagging, or any the infinite number of non-constructive ways of aggressively or passive aggressively expressing anger).  I’m serious, it does not work.  There is an interesting expression that is part of our vernacular that people use to describe when they are upset and act out of anger. They say “He (or she) took me out of my character.”  The expression addresses that we have a common view of ourselves as decent, patient, intelligent, and loving, and that when we get upset and act of anger it is not coherent with how we see our core identity.  If you are not sociopathic it does not feel good to treat others disrespectfully.  We may feel justified in acting out of anger, but we do not feel good.  Perhaps the only thing we control in life is our own actions.  If we are to feel good about ourselves we must take full responsibility for the actions we take and take actions that are in line with how we see ourselves and the lives and relationships we want to build and sustain.  By staying in character and being our best and most decent self we do our part and need not continue to experience the regret and remorse of acting out of anger.