September, 2010

Our Wake-Up Attitude is Pre-Determined

Posted by docapc at 7:08 pm

I was listening to a client this morning tell me that every day when she awakens her first thoughts are always anxious. She immediately thinks of the problems she must face. Her tension is visible in the mirror as she washes her face and her perspective has already become narrowed as anxiety produces worry. Worry limits her ability to view problems objectively which in turn causes a panicky state as she walks out the door to face the day. 

                                              How Come I’m so Negative?

I asked my client how she was awakened as a child. “Oh my God is was horrible, my mother would try to be kind for a few minutes but sooner or later she would start with all this tension, telling us were already late, we have to hurry and eat, she would be grabbing clothes out of the closet and talking so fast I just wanted to hide under the pillows”.

    Rita’s mom was chronically late, relatively unprepared for the day herself, and usually worried she would be late for work so she unintentionally passed her anxious, worrisome ways onto her children as their eyes first saw daybreak. Rita learned from this habitual pattern that each day ahead should be approached very carefully, something was going to go wrong and you should always be prepared. This worry made her mind speed, and her ability to calm herself was non-existent. She was prescribed Ritalin in those days because her teachers thought her concentration was poor, her ability to attend and focus seemed to be neurologically programmed, and medication was seen as the answer to this dilemma. Needless to say Rita never realized in her teens that she was not necessarily a child with ADD, but was rather a child being programmed for worry and negativity.

                                           Can Worry be changed to Optimism?

  The answer is yes, but not without hard work. The first step is to identify, as Rita has, the origin of this conditioned way to beginning the day. If we were awakened to an environment of worry, anxiety, neglect, inattention, anger, irritation or any other negative emotional state we are carrying that habitual behavior with us today. We need to be very focused to turn our old embedded thinking pattern around so we can begin each day with an open, appreciative attitude.

  Rita is a single mom, waking her 8 year old daughter with the tension she herself brings into the world every day. She then gets irritated with her daughter, just as her mother did with her, when she doesn’t obey her commands immediately. She starts to worry about being late for work, about forgetting something like her daughters lunch etc. When this tension filled process ends she is on her way to work in a state of mind that assures difficulty focusing, difficulty remembering and difficulty being able to perceive with an expanded view.

    I asked Rita what she hoped would have been different in her own family experience. “ I wish my mom could have been affectionate, hugged me in my bed, a little kiss, soft words easing me into the day, I just wished she could have made me feel secure, made me feel like everything would be ok, sent me off with a smile rather than with that worried look of hers”.

                                              Changing a Habit means Changing Behavior

 I could have told Rita to exercise, mediate and eat nutriously to start her day, all valuable means to calmness. However Rita’s longings gave her the answers she was looking for, the most important variable to change. If she begins doing what she wished for she will not only change her daughter’s story but in the process she will change her own. We change by doing; it must be an active process. It is never easy; Rita will have to train herself to approach her daughter differently every day for some time before it will feel natural. One thing I know: if this new beginning makes Rita and her daughter happy it will continue and become a natural way of being.

                                                       Arthur P. Ciaramicoli, Ed.D., Ph.D.

Matters of the Heart aren’t Rational

Posted by docapc at 7:10 pm

       When I was studying at a psychoanalytic institute many years ago I heard the saying “we all marry parts of our mother and father”. At the time being a single man I thought this idea was a bit extreme. Now after 30 years of treating couples and from my own personal experience I can say it is not so farfetched. Of course it stands to reason that we are attracted to what is familiar, particularly familiar behavior. People often wonder why they pick people to love who ultimately present them with the same conflictual issues they experienced in their families. It seems paradoxical but in fact it makes good sense. We return to the scene of the crime whenever we have not resolved old issues, whenever we don’t understand how our emotions regarding love developed.

   Babies learn to love their parents without knowing if they are beautiful, handsome, intelligent, rich or poor. It is not an intellectual exercise. The memories of these early experiences, when we are cognitively not able to discern what appropriate behavior is and what it is not, are recorded deep in our psyche without our awareness. We remember experiences based on feel far more than experiences based on fact.

                                             But Love Should Make Sense!

    Intelligent people often become disturbed because they falsely believe that because they are intellectually quite capable they should be able to pick the right love partner. Not so I am afraid. Bill Clinton by all accounts is quite intelligent, has a highly developed capacity for empathy, yet he had an affair with an intern in the white house. We all know quite capable people who seem to make ridiculous choices in love relationships. When we fall in love all reason goes out the window. Why? Because matters of the heart are not governed by reason. Until we understand the story we created in our minds about ourselves and love early in life we are governed by those initial experiences.

                                              Returning to the Scene of the Crime

     Let me give you an example. Recently I began working with a woman in her mid-thirties who was referred to me because her marriage was falling apart. She called shortly after her husband was arrested for a DUI, driving under the influence. She is an attractive, intelligent woman who one would think would have been able to choose a good life partner. Marie’s husband by all accounts is an active alcoholic. The irony that troubles her most is that when she met Paul she was determined to pick someone unlike her father. Her dad, who she loves dearly, is also an alcoholic. She has tried to rescue him throughout her life; he has never accepted treatment, refused to go to AA and to this day remains active and a constant worry for Marie. So why would she return to the scene of the crime if alcoholism caused her so much pain?

                                              Matters of the Heart Bring us Back in Time

   We return to our past behavioral patterns that were emotionally hard wired if we have never worked on understanding our story and resolved past conflicts. Today Marie realizes she denied the extent of Paul’s drinking because unconsciously she was returning to the past in an effort to emerge with a different result. She could never facilitate her father becoming sober but with her rescue mentality she felt, and I accent “felt”, she could finally be effective in saving a man in distress. She had always been the one trying to help her dad, and even today she is the only one of three sisters who remains in contact with her dad.

                                      Everyone has a Unique Love Story

   Marie’s story is fairly straightforward and not complicated to understand. However many of us have more complicated stories that result in confusion in terms of who we choose to love. Make sure you spend time getting to know yourself in relationships with others before you make love choices that could bring you back in time in an unfortunate way. It’s complicated for sure but when you’re in empathic relationships with rational others, when your able to give and receive feedback openly we are all in a position to learn a great deal about the story we carry forward to new people.

        If you are interested in learning more about this subject please read chapter 7 in The Curse of the Capable, Learning to Read Between the Lines-Intimacy.

                                                Arthur P. Ciaramicoli, Ed.D., Ph.D.

Strategies to Cope with Irrational People

Posted by docapc at 2:59 pm

We all encounter people who are irrational. We are all are irrational due to life circumstances on occasion. If you lose a night’s sleep due to the flu, having to get up in the middle of the night to soothe a crying child, or work too many hours you can feel depleted and your tolerance is low. This kind of irrationality is common and shouldn’t be taken very seriously.

     A second type of irrationality is embedded in a particular dysfunctional way a person perceives. There are individuals who typically are irrational, not due to the type of circumstances in their lives but rather their personality style consistently perceives inaccurately, it is part of their character.

   How do you cope if this individual is your boss, your boyfriend, your relative and God forbid your spouse?

    Our nervous systems talk to each other, as one voice intensifies it raises the blood pressure of the other person in addition to releasing stress hormones, all of which can cloud our thinking and reduce our ability to respond with reason. Whenever you hear someone begin to escalate try to teach yourself to respond slowly, wait and think a moment before you talk. If you are reactive you become part of the problem. If you consistently personalize the other person’s remarks, rather than understanding their personality, it often means they have evoked sensitive areas in your story you never resolved. The following example may help clarify my point.

                                         One Couple’s Ongoing Impasse

   I met with a very bright man yesterday who was telling me he can’t cope with his wife’s ridiculous criticisms that are based, in his opinion, on her perfectionist personality. “Once she starts I can’t resist and we end up yelling at each other over and over again in front of our children”. He needed to understand his role in this conflict before he could manage the emotional heat successfully. After some exploration it became clear that her perfectionism was insulting his perfectionism. “I try to do everything right all day, I always succeed except with her, I can’t stand being criticized, she brings me down to my knees”. It’s easy to understand in this example that he can’t resist and slow down his reactions because he feels his self esteem is being threatened, his view of himself is being damaged.

                                  Don’t Accept Every Invitation to the Party!

     The example of my client should clue us into the idea that it takes two to tango. If we can’t resist losing our temper it almost always means we are being reminded of our negative story that we never re-wrote. My client is reminded each time his wife criticizes him of the home he grew up in where he always felt driven by his parents to perform better and better. He is an accomplished attorney, professional pianist, avid cyclist and studies the trumpet in his spare time to prove his worth. Problem is he never felt loved for just “being”, he only felt loved for “doing”. His wife is threatening his image as he re-visits his old view of himself and this makes him livid. He can’t stand the old feeling of not being loved for who he is rather than what he provides.

                                              What is the way out?

Follow these steps: 1) Slow down your reaction, and if you can’t take notice of the old story your repeating and seek help to expand your awareness and change the old view of yourself  2) Acknowledge the other person’s emotion without taking responsibility for their actions, for instance you can say, “I am sorry your offended but I didn’t intend to hurt you”, 3) Set limits, despite indicating you regret your friend is hurting be clear as to what you consider reasonable. “I am sorry your hurt but I don’t accept you yelling at me”, 4) Stick to the facts, no matter how unreasonable the other person becomes, “ I am simply asking you to stop yelling, to come to work on time, etc”, don’t get sidetracked into other topics 5) once you know a person is irrational consistently prepare by not expecting a sane dialogue, you are the only who can keep the conversation civil, 6) if all else fails, if the emotional irrationality continues, de-invest, walk away, don’t provoke just indicate that the conversation is not productive and you’re not going to continue further.

       Finally, and most importantly, if you continue to over-react even though you know the other person is being irrational, accept responsibility that it is your past sensitivities that accentuate the dilemma.  My client will never be free until he works out the hurt he experienced in the past and comes to know the truth about himself in the present. Why is this so very important? One compelling reason is that we often, unconsciously, choose love partners to repeat the old story. What I call “returning to the scene of the crime”. A formula for ongoing unhappiness.

                                          Arthur P. Ciaramicoli, Ed.D., Ph.D.

Change Your Negative Life Story

Posted by docapc at 12:41 am

I try to teach my clients and those close to me that negativity is a learned perspective. When we are growing up we are all exposed to views of the world that are not objective or reasonable. Anthony, one of my group clients grew up with parents from two different countries who met in Europe during the last world war. Even though they have been living in the United States for over 50 years they still consider themselves to be suffering from prejudice from American neighbors and former co­­‑workers. Anthony grew up hearing Americans are greedy, selfish and biased against all foreigners. His parent’s pessimism pervaded much of their thinking and he was often told to shy away from anything unfamiliar. Basically their view of life was to take no chances and never stray from family as “outsiders” could not be trusted. He realized as time went on that his parents assertions were mainly based on their own insecurities and unwillingness to trust.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 Despite knowing this reality as an adult he has remained an untrusting person, very afraid to take chances and afraid that he will be ridiculed if he reveals his true nature to anyone. His first wife eventually left him as she could no longer tolerate his unhealthy attachment to his parents and his un-willingness to make friends and socialize.

      Anthony, interestingly, is a member of one of my group sessions where 4 of the 10 members were born in other countries and all immigrated to the states in the last several years. Anthony was initially surprised that these individuals did not experience the bias he expected. In fact three of them were recruited by American companies, helped to find housing and were graciously received by their colleagues. They had difficulty of course, adjusting to a new culture but none spoke of the bias that Anthony had been taught to experience. It wasn’t just the fact that members from other lands had a different experience that eventually made the difference in his world view.

        What changed his pessimism into a reality based view of life?                                                     First and most importantly he developed trust in myself and group members. As he said “I can see and really feel how you all care about each other, at first I thought you were all playing a role but over time I realized you were complete strangers at one time, from all over the world and now you have come to truly like and respect each other, you’re like a family of friends”.

        Eventually, based on this established trust, Anthony was able to systematically examine his views of life and their accuracy. He essentially was able to obtain a consensus view based on objective feedback rather than the hard wiring he adopted from his family. This is the critical juncture for change. We can only change our old story by having the courage to take in objective feedback in the present. I have seen this process result in profound changes in many lives. It is not simple or easy, it requires the courage to change based on your faith in the well meaning of others trying to help you move forward in life while leaving the biases of the past behind. Anthony and many others who are truth seekers, what I call “spiritual learners” arrive at a place of comfort within and with others that is truly life saving. One of my previous blogs describes the “spiritual learner” concept and chapter 16 in “The Curse of the Capable-With an Open Heart and Open Mind-The Spiritual Learner” is a more complete reference for you as well.

We don’t earn acts of Grace!

Posted by docapc at 1:19 am

      I was cycling the other day, near our summer home along the beautiful coast of Maine with a wonderful long time friend. As we passed thunderous waves he turned to me and said, “You work so hard you have earned this, I’m so glad for you”. He was surprised that I disagreed that I “had earned this” and immediately thought I was being self critical. He was mistaken in that I wasn’t feeling self critical at all, just realistic from my point of view. I know many people, friends and clients, who have worked as hard as I have and they have died of prostate cancer, breast and uterine cancer, and some are terminally at the moment. They have earned this good fortune as much or more than I.                                                            I think when we grow up with a negative story about ourselves we tend to have a punitive self voice. We believe that our fate in life is due to our achievements, our successes and when things don’t go well we feel less than, as if we failed and didn’t perform as well as we should. This attitude puts us at the center of all life circumstances, it makes us mistakenly think our lives and the lives of those close to us are exclusively dependent on our actions. We are therefore never in a position to accept acts of grace. Grace comes are way not because of what we do or what we don’t do. It is a variable some believe is directed by God, others believe it is the Universe directing our fate. I will leave the potential debate as to the causal agent of grace to theologians who possess far more wisdom than I in this matter. 

        The critical point for our purposes is that we are often not in control of the circumstances that effect our lives. When self criticism is an integral part of your self voice is it hard to accept that you are not always accountable for the direction of your life. If you were held overly accountable early in life, made to feel unrealistically responsible for others this tendency can be crippling and needs to change for you to feel emotionally liberated.

       Life, to a certain degree is like the weather. It is a beautiful day today, sun is shining, and the sea is glistening. I have been given, through grace, a beautiful day. I didn’t earn it, nor would I be responsible if it were raining. I am, of course, not implying that we have no control, just that we do not have ultimate control. We need to be able

 to distinguish what comes under our roof and what does not. I refer you to chapter 5 in “The Curse of the Capable, Loosen the Rains and Lift the Burden-Control” for further study if you wish.

Are you Preoccupied or Selfish?

Posted by docapc at 1:15 am

In this morning’s group session one of our members abruptly announced he was going to take a three month trip across country with his wife and would be leaving group. Members were astounded as we have a guideline that when someone is going to leave they pick a date, and give advanced notice so we can go through a compete process of saying goodbye. This entails giving and receiving direct feedback, settling any leftover conflicts etc so the ending will feel and be complete. I have been through this process many times with clients and I have noticed over the years that the way people end, in essence how they deal with loss, is quite predictive of how their life will go in the future.

   How we cope with endings, how direct or indirect we are in our communication says a great deal about our ability to maintain closeness, intimacy and friendship. Rob is a very good person but highly self critical despite being enormously successful in his business, which is why he can afford to take such long vacations. He has suffered, by his own admission what I call “The Curse of the Capable”. He masks his insecurity and vulnerability through his achievements. This method has worked for him in business but certainly not in marriage and with the relationships in his life.

   Rob’s inability to let people know in advance that he was leaving fits with a number of difficulties he encounters in his life. He had difficulty telling his dying father that he loved him, he has difficulty telling his adult children how much he cares, turns his head away from whomever he is addressing when he is saying something positive that could bring about an intimate feeling. He struggles, in essence, with the fear of not being good enough in the eyes of others. He has difficulty taking the chance of being vulnerable, a necessary step to maintain intimacy, because of his irrational personal story that views vulnerability as exposing weakness and insecurity. He was afraid he would disappoint people if they knew in advance of his departure, he didn’t have the faith in himself to believe he could state his intentions and emerge with a positive rather than a negative outcome. Ironically we are all happy for him that he is finally leaving work and making a giant step to enjoying life.

   He told the group that he thought we knew he was leaving since he had mentioned on different occasions about taking such a trip. He mentioned that he had this conversation in his head so many times it felt like it actually took place. Another common dynamic of those who are preoccupied is that they have meetings in their minds so often they start to act upon these meetings as if others actually attended. The other result of being preoccupied is a person like Rob thinks about a particular issue so much they expect others to appreciate their efforts and understand their needs when do they finally let others in on their obsessive thought process at its conclusion. One of the women he has helped considerably told him she was very disappointed that he did not have the concern to inform us, or have the trust in group members to let us in on his plans. Another member, a fellow business owner who has felt considerable camaraderie with Bob, echoed her sentiment but added, “I think below the surface Rob you are a very selfish man, I think you tend to want things your way and don’t consider how you affect other people”.

      I interjected at the end of the meeting that I think there are in fact, two kinds of selfishness. One is based on truly not caring about people, individuals who are narcissistic by nature and use other people simply for the self interested function they have. The other, particularly for people who suffer from The Curse is based on being preoccupied. Rob is not a good listener for instance; he is often planning his response as a person is talking to him. He is so worried about his image that he is rehearsing his response rather than listening. Like many who are preoccupied his memory and concentration are compromised which leads to people close to him feeling un-important and not heard. People, like group members, end up feeling that he is self centered and selfish. I think, through knowing Rob for some time, that this is a surface explanation and does not speak to the anxiety he is experiencing on a deeper level. He is not a man who does not care; he loves his wife, his children and truly cares about group members. His preoccupation however, a common dynamic among achievers, makes his relationships less than satisfying. The irony is that when he relaxes, pays attention, gets involved beyond himself, people find him loveable and kind. Rob must change the old story in his mind that says love and respect is dependent on achievement to the realization that achievement is important in life but ultimately without the relationship skill of empathic listening life will always feel like something is missing.

   As group ended we could all see Rob felt awful, several people encouraged him to continue phone sessions with me and to not perseverate on the negative comments exclusively. He certainly had a strong tendency to cement criticisms in his mind. As I walked out of group with him, everyone was waiting in the parking lot. They all hugged him individually and made him make eye contact. As he walked away with tears in his eyes, I asked him how come he didn’t hug me. He returned, looked directly at me, and gave me a huge hug and said “ I wish I had the courage to let people in more, I am still afraid of the outcome, guess I just didn’t want to feel vulnerable, I love everybody in this group, including you”. As I walked away I said to myself,” This is not a selfish man!”