Posts in category: PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

Are You In An Expressive or Depressive Relationship?

You are either in an “expressive” or a “depressive” relationship because of your preferred communication style. An expressive relationship encourages an open mind and flowing emotions. Thus, open talking solves problems and promotes the fresh air of change.

In contrast, a depressive relationship encourages closed minds, closed mouths, closed ears, and blocked emotions. Thus, defensive talking peppers the relationship and perpetuates problems and promotes the stale air of unfair fights that go nowhere.

“It’s my way or hit the highway!” is the stamp of a depressive relationship…while “It’s our way on the two-way communicator highway!” is the calling card of an expressive relationship.

WHY CAN’T WE TALK? Empathizer vs. Instigator Communicators

1. If you are an Empathizer-type (E-type) communicator, you will try harder and harder and harder to “make things right” when talks go astray. You will shy away from giving negative feedback because you don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.
2. In contrast, if you are an Instigator-type communicator you will be quite comfortable giving negative feedback and less comfortable hearing and using negative feedback that heralds change.

A Perfect Divorce Storm

Divorce isn’t mysterious. People who divorce use defensive talk tactics that stall out problem solving and togetherness. When emotions aren’t addressed and problems aren’t resolved…resentment builds until a breaking point is reached. A perfect divorce storm awaits you if you continue to talk defensively and ineffectively.

CHANGE HAPPENS! Including in relationships, personalities, habit patterns, tastes and compulsions…ALL LIFE LONG. After all, tigers can change their stripes, dogs can learn new tricks and “brainy” human beings can change at any stage in life. Who ya’ callin’ a dog, anyway? So why not spruce up your communication skills…attacking the problem and not the person?

Always remember this: Expressing yourself doesn’t mean defensive talking that puts off change and puts down people.

Dr. Dennis O’Grady is a Clinical Professor at the Wright State University School of Professional Psychology and the author of Talk to Me: Communication moves to get along with anyone

DEFENSIVE TALKING LEADING CAUSE OF DIVORCE OR BREAKUP

Relationship expert and researcher Dr. John Gottman (http://www.gottman.com/) has found defensive talking to be the leading indicator(s) of a divorce or breakup.

When you have a “failure to communicate,” you will become an anger communicator and use some of these defensive talk tactics or guilt bombs to the detriment of all.

1. Threats. Unilateral verbal threats to take some drastic action that will cause an unwanted loss to the partner, such as: “If you keep this up I’ll have to…” or “Maybe this just isn’t going to work out between us!” or “Shouldn’t we quit while we’re ahead?” or “If you accuse me of doing IT, I might as well do IT!” Or “Why should I try to talk to you when you don’t ever listen to me?”

2. Icing. Ignoring the partner to show disapproval, such as: “I don’t have time right now…I’ll have to get back to you!” or “You’re so high maintenance!” or “I’m not in the mood tonight!” or “Who do you always expect to come first? You can’t always expect to be number one!” Non-verbal icing comes in the form of not writing back to an e-mail or not returning a call when that would otherwise be the custom.

3. Critiques. Criticizing the personality (or personal habits) of a talk partner, such as: “Why do you always have to be so negative!” or “Not EVERYone’s a perfectionist like you are!” or “You worry too much!” or “Why don’t you take some responsibility for a change?” or “There you go again…making a mountain out of a tiny mole hill!”

4. Slams. Disowning what is true about the self by blaming the partner for the projected trait(s), such as: “You can dish out criticism but you sure can’t take it!” or “It’s always ALL about you!” or “Why can’t you listen with an open mind for a change?” or “You are SO wrong about that!” or “You play the victim violin to get sympathy!” or “All you ever do is think about your own selfish needs…it’s big “I” and belittling ‘U’!”

5. Pessimism. Claiming that change CAN’T happen to you, such as: “BUT what can I do about it…I’ve been doing IT for so long now!” or “Why should I even try? I’m never, ever going to be good enough for you!” or “I’ve tried everything, but nothing works, so I give up!” or “I can’t do anything about IT because it’s out of my hands!” or “Whatever I try to do for you just makes things worse!”

6. Mad On. Using angry words or actions that derail calm talks, such as: “You’ve got a real anger issue, you know!” “Why can’t you control your temper?” or “There’s nothing to get so upset about!” or “Why can’t you just forgive the past and move on!” or “Don’t go away mad…just go away!” or “Why are you so mad at me when I’ve done nothing wrong?” or “You’re insane and out of control when you’re mad!”

7. Slanting. Slanting a discussion to lend proof to one’s viewpoint, such as: “Why can’t you just get over IT?” or “You claim to be a Christian but you can’t forgive.” or “Why do you have to always get so uptight?” or “Hey, read my hand…the past is over so get over IT!” or “Why are you always trying to control everything and everyone?”

8. Guilt Bombs. Detonating guilt bombs, such as: “After all I’ve done for you…this is your way of repaying me!” or “You’ve got to understand that I didn’t mean anything by it!” or “What did I do to you that made you say such hateful things to me?” or “Why are other people/things more important to you than me?”

9. Jumping To Conclusions. Jumping to conclusions when anxiety and worries mount, such as: “I know this isn’t going to work out!” or “This will be all my/your fault if something bad happens!” or “I know the other shoe is going to drop soon!” or “It’s no use trying to communicate with you!” or “Men aren’t very good communicators, so why expect them to be?”

10. Extremism. Using extreme thinking or emotions to win a point in a talk debate, such as: “Don’t blame me because I can’t make you feel anything!” “It’s not my fault!” “You are responsible for your own feelings and life!” “I didn’t mean to do it…IT was an accident so why are you so upset?” or “I can’t do anything about it…it’s out of my power!” or “Grow up! Here you are just throwing a fit and acting like a baby!”

In short, positive communication skills can save your business and yourself a load of grief…and they comprise the business of marriage and partnership. Hope is here: It’s never too late to spruce up your communication skills and add tools to your talk tool box.

Dr. Dennis O’Grady is a Clinical Professor at the Wright State University School of Professional Psychology. Dennis is also a communications psychologist from Dayton, Ohio, and the author of Talk to Me: Communication moves to get along with anyone at www.drogrady.com

Make Time To Talk

You will get tips galore to pump up your spirits when they have been flattened by the sharp nail of “bad” communication here. My pick of the top 12 listening/talking skills to drive skillfully and sanely on the two-way communicator highway are:

1. Listen with three ears
2. Don’t confuse critical feedback with personal criticism
3. Treat people you dislike kindly
   
4. Like change
   
5. Ask open-ended questions…then LISTEN
6. When you need to say goodbye…say why
7. Keep your word
   
8. Repeat what you think you heard
   
9. Go the extra (S)mile when you feel down
10. Tell the emotional truth without censorship or shame
11. Adopt the strengths of your opposite communicator type
12. Respect that “chatter is cheap” while “talk is expensive”

If your talks are full of conflict, “warm and fuzzy feelings” you’re accustomed to at work will be replaced by cold shoulders, and the “warm and fuzzies” at home will evolve into turned backs in bed.

And like it or not: When a cold wind blows through the home of work or the home of love…we seek warmer fires to comfort ourselves by.

Dr. Dennis O’Grady is a communications psychologist from Dayton, Ohio, and and the author of TALK TO ME: Communication moves to get along with anyone

“Couples have tough calls to make–yet many don’t talk about finances.”

A lead article today in USA TODAY discussed how many couples don’t talk effectively about money. Seems that sex is an easier topic to talk about, although good communication seems as rare in marriage as clean air these days.

As a communications psychologist, I’ve learned that “satisfaction with communication” is directly and powerfully linked to a partner’s overall and emotional and physical health. Thus, the consequences of “I just can’t talk to my partner about….” are staggering and monumental for both Empathizer-type communicators and Instigator-type communicators alike.

• Miscommunication or no communication dims the inner light of an E-type or Empathizer communicator who burns out emotionally when talks don’t work to change anyone
  

• Missed or no communication drains the physical battery of an I-type or Instigator communicator who burns up physically when talks don’t fix problems

Control Freaks: “My money is MY money…and your money is MY money!” is a benchmark of a controlling relationship. Love doesn’t thrive where control lives.

“Why can’t we talk now?”

Why can’t we talk without shame and blame interfering causing a standoff? Why don’t we talk about money… sex… religion… politics… elders… dreams… disagreements, etc. far more easily and free of power plays that distance co-communicators? You and I don’t talk because we fear making a partner mad or hurt and turning him/her into an anger communicator.

The Blame and Shame Show

The blame and shame show assassinates healthy communciation. Being an angry communicator is a distraction…a manipulative attempt to control people and emotions that doesn’t solve problems or create needed changes.

If you can’t talk…you can’t have a constructive disagreement without casting stones of blame at the face or backside of a partner. Finding fault and finger pointing is a cycle or “bad habit” that unaware couples slip into quite fast. In short order, we sacrifice the self while blaming the other for being SO selfish…when the truth is we’re both losing out big-time.

William F. Cornell

Abstract
This article weaves together a description of the process of transactional analysis psychotherapy with an account of one client’s therapy-a client who asked, “What am I getting myself into?” as she started her work. This essay seeks to convey both the mechanisms and the experience of psychotherapy. It emphasizes work with psychological scripts and transference, the exploration of new possibilities for thinking and living, skill development, and the promotion of new neural pathways as the primary means of change in psychotherapy.
______

“So, what am I getting myself into here?”
Suzanne asked me this question toward the end of our initial session. She had led quite a life up to the point she decided to enter therapy. As she approached retirement from her post as a university professor and campus minister, her life, at least from the outside, seemed full of accomplishment and-one would imagine-personal satisfaction. Suzanne was one of a handful of women to gain admission to a certain theological seminary and eventually to become ordained, although only after a valiant struggle. Ultimately, she rose to a position of leadership within her denomination.

Suzanne was the only one of her siblings to leave the area where she grew up, the only one to go to college, the only one to win any visible acclaim. And yet she was the black sheep of the family. Now, as she approached retirement, she was alienated from her family and did not experience much pride or satisfaction in her professional accomplishments. Throughout a lifetime of professional struggle and gain, she lived alone, could not sustain close personal relationships, and suffered recurrent bouts of depression. She was terrified of a retirement marked by loneliness and depression. Suzanne decided to enter psychotherapy to see if she could understand and change her depressive and isolating tendencies and thus anticipate a different sort of retirement. Suzanne, like many people who enter psychotherapy, was extremely successful in some realms of her life and lost and ineffective in others. Psychotherapy works to deepen self-understanding so as to increase the range of personal autonomy and effectiveness in a person’s life.

Suzanne consciously chose transactional analysis psychotherapy because she had read a number of transactional analysis books and found them sensible and somewhat helpful. She had done enough reading and talking with colleagues to know that many of transactional analysis authors and organizational leaders were women. Some had even made contributions to the feminist literature. She said she understood herself better from the reading but still could not significantly change her way of living. She chose me as her therapist because she knew I practiced transactional analysis and because she knew a couple of colleagues who had seen me for treatment. They considered their work with me successful and had recommended me to her.

After Suzanne asked what she was getting into, I responded that I did not really understand the intent of her question. She explained that she wanted to know what she could expect to accomplish and how psychotherapy might help. She wanted to be reasonably sure that she was spending her limited time and money well. She said she knew people who had really changed in psychotherapy, “but I don’t understand what psychotherapy is or how it works.” The answer did not roll out of my brain and off my tongue. I took up her question seriously and answered it as best I could. At that point in my practice, I routinely asked my clients what they needed to know about me, but it had never occurred to me that clients might have the same question about psychotherapy itself. How does it work? What am I getting myself into? I have since learned that many clients enter therapy with this question in mind but do not feel free to ask it.

This essay is my answer to the questions of how transactional analysis therapy works and what you, as a client, might be getting yourself into. Your therapist-even if she or he has a transactional analysis frame of reference-may have a different perspective. Ask. Push past the standard theoretical explanations to talk more openly with your therapist about what you each know and expect of psychotherapy, what you each know and believe about how people change. That initial discussion can lay an important foundation for the work you will do together.

Psychotherapy is a hard and exciting endeavor. It is work, rewarding work. Transactional analysis psychotherapy is a collaborative effort (“collaborate” comes from the Latin word collaborare, which means “labor together”). You and your therapist will have a working relationship, one that may be gentle and supportive at times but challenging, conflictual, and even disorganizing at others. Your therapist’s primary job is to provide you with a respectful and reliable space within which the two of you (or perhaps a group of you) can reflect, explore, and experiment with feelings, beliefs, and interpersonal behavior. Things that you may have taken for granted about yourself, life, and others will be opened to question. You will have the opportunity to examine how you relate to yourself internally and with others interpersonally. You will work with your present-day relationships, on the one hand, and look at the lingering influences of childhood relationships on the formation of your beliefs, feelings, and behavior, on the other. Your willingness to question, be questioned, reflect, challenge your beliefs, and experiment with new possibilities is at the heart of your job as a client.

In the remainder of this essay I will consider how transactional analysis psychotherapy works by addressing four areas of the therapeutic process: script formation and insight, new possibilities for feeling and thinking, skill development, and changes in neural pathways. I will return to Suzanne’s life and the work she and I did together to offer some concrete examples of how the process works.