The Responsibility Game

The Journey

“One day you finally knew

what you had to do, and began

though the voices around you

kept shouting

their bad advice—

though the whole house

began to tremble

and you felt the old tug

at your ankles.

“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.

But you didn’t stop.

You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers

at the very foundations

though their melancholy

was terrible.

It was already late

enough, and a wild night
and the road full of fallen

branches and stone.

But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,

the stars began to burn

through the sheets of clouds,

and there was a new voice

which you slowly

recognized as your own,

that kept you company

as you strode deeper and deeper

into the world,

determined to do

the only thing you could do—

determined to save

the only life you could save.”

Mary Oliver

 

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The Responsibility Game

Lynne Namka Ed. D. © 2008

People from all over the world write to me, mostly women but sometimes it’s a man, asking about what they can do to help their loved one or family member “control” his or her anger.  Or how they can help “diffuse” their partner’s anger.  They say that their partner is “such a good guy or a good woman” and the only flaw is the “anger problem.”  Or they feel so sorry for their out-of-control child or abusive parent who hurts others.  This well-meaning intention to help is good but it is misplaced as it enables the angry person to stay as he is.  The only person who can change their anger is the angry person. 

Feelings of pity and guilt over someone else’s inability to stop doing something harmful to themselves like drinking or drugging, getting angry or get their homework done or anything that the rest of the world is able to do but they can’t/won’t are a waste of energy.  Guilt and feeling sorry for someone is at the bottom of the codependency need to fix someone else as a defensive maneuver so that you don’t look at your own behavior. 

We get the relationships we are willing to put up with.  We were not able to choose the family of our childhood, and how they dealt with stressors.  Some caring partners accept the negative behaviors of others and never insist on change.  If you have felt helpless in your childhood with an angry parent, you may think that angry relationships are the way life is supposed to be.  Living with anger may be familiar to you, but it is not healthy.  One fifty-two-year-old woman described the freedom she felt when she finally learned to assertively say to her nit-picking husband, “Don’t go there.  Just don’t go there.”

Put “checks and balances” in the areas where your partner’s behavior gets out of control. Calmly calling your partner on his bad behavior may work if he has some voice of reason within and a willingness for fairness and justice.  A person whose behavior is continually disturbing to others needs feedback at a time when he is calm as to how he hurts others so he can evaluate the consequences of his actions.  Calling a person on the consequences of their behavior helps maintain the moral order of the relationship.  Loving firmness is the best way to talk to a person about his unacceptable behavior. Remind him that fair is fair and you expect him to be reasonable with his anger.  There are unspoken boundaries between couples that are played out with nonverbal and verbal snippets of control behaviors.  One man said, “I can’t talk to her directly about her nagging as she blows up as she’s too sensitive to hear any criticism.  So when it gets too bad, I glare and she backs off.  We’ve got this “Glare and back off contract that she isn’t even aware of!”

One way to maintain fairness is to insist on having a correction technique for all members of the household.  Correction is a behavioral technique where the person who messes up the environment is required to clean it up as an offer of restitution.  The correction procedure holds people responsible for their misbehavior by requiring them to undo, as much as possible, the damage they have done.  Correction of what has been disturbed in the environment gives practical penalties for disturbing the home and the people who have been affected.  With correction, the person who throws things must pick them up and return them to their proper place.  If he breaks things, he must replace them.  If he yells and screams, he must apologize to those he has disturbed.  Correction procedures should be installed with all members of the family. 

Just like two-year-olds, grownup temper tantrums last longer when a person has an audience.  You need not stay in the same room with a raging person.  Warn him that you will leave when he is yelling and go take care of yourself.  Don’t stick around and take the barrage of ugly words.  Take the children and leave quietly, saying that you are not running away but are giving him some space to cool off and you hope that the next time he will take his own time out.  Go to another room or get in the car and leave for a while.  If he gets angry because he is fearful of being alone, level with him to show that his anger will create his being left alone for awhile for both of you to cool off.  You are not abandoning him but you are removing yourself from his anger. 

A common myth is that people have no control over their feelings. That’s old thinking—now with all the techniques and anger management classes that we have available for anger release, blowing up in anger at others is a choice. Watch how you enable other people’s bad behavior.  Do you make excuses for him?  Do you tell the children that their dad can’t help it?  It is not your job to try to get anyone else to “diffuse” or “control” his anger.  It is the job of each angry person to take care of his anger and find appropriate ways to express it.  An angry person may not have the motivation to do so.  If you excuse him repeatedly for his outbursts without any consequences, why should he be expected to change?

Don’t be held hostage by other people’s feelings.  And while you are at it, take a look at your own anger responses.  You and only you are responsible for your thinking and the way you think creates the type of life that you will create.  No other person or thing has the ability to get inside your head and pushes a button marked anger.  Nobody pulls your chain, pulls your trigger or pushes your button.  Only you make yourself feel what you feel.  The bottom line is that you are always responsible for what you think, say and do. And you are responsible if you have allowed another person to treat you with disrespect!  

Positive Self-Talk Affirmations:

I am responsible for my thoughts, feelings and actions.

I am responsible for deciding what I will and will not stand for.

I am responsible for how I treat people and allow them to treat me.

I can only feel good about myself if I live in accordance with my positive values. 

I affirm that I am healthy and whole and I am worthy of being a happy person.

Be gentle with yourself; you are learning to be more honest with yourself to break into habits of a lifetime. If you slip up and revert back to a behavior you dislike, analyze what went wrong. Tell yourself that you made a slip and you will be more careful next time. You will get better over time. You are responsible for how you act in the future.  Forgive yourself for doing what you have learned and vow to be different.   If you do an Energy Psychology technique about your behavior and the beliefs that lie underneath it, you will be less likely to slip in the future.

A client recently said to me, “I am willing to do whatever I need to do to become whole.  That includes challenging my defense mechanisms over and over.”  Wow!  What courage that took to be willing to confront the unhealthy behaviors that other threw at her.  

Peace and joy,

Lynne

This article is taken from my book, Your Quick Anger Makeover: Plus Twenty Other Cutting-edge Techniques to Release Anger!

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My new website HappyHealthyLoving.com is up and running thanks to my web master Bob Silverstein. It is chock full of ideas for living in loving relationships.

 

Questions regarding the content of this newsletter, comments or written contributions can be directed to Nancy Swain, editor at inspirationcontact@yahoo.com.  You may also contact Nancy if you wish to be removed from the mailing list.  Please do not contact Lynne Namka via reply email.  Please remember that I cannot provide you with any advice of a personal nature. But help is out there somewhere!  Do reach out and get a qualified professional to help you sort through your issues.  

Please check out my web site www.AngriesOut.com for ideas and numerous downloadable articles on a wide range of subjects.  You can also click on the ‘Finding a Therapist’ link to take you to the section entitled, “Finding a Competent Therapist with Great Training.”  If you get removed from this newsletter by accident, go back to www.AngriesOut.com and scroll down to Lynne’s Free Newsletter and ask to subscribe once more.

Most of all, let love guide your life.

 Colossians 3:14

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The Awakening, by Sonny Carroll © 1999

"That which we persist in doing becomes easier - not that the nature of the task has changed, but our ability has increased."

Ralph Waldo Emerson


An Inspirational Reminder…..


The Awakening, by Sonny Carroll © 1999


A time comes in your life when you finally get it. When in the midst of all your fears and insanity you stop dead in your tracks and somewhere the voice in your head cries out - ENOUGH!



Enough fighting and crying, or struggling to hold on. And, like a child quieting down after a blind tantrum, your sobs begin to subside, you shudder once or twice, you blink back your tears and through a mantle of wet lashes you begin to look at the world through new eyes.



This is your awakening.



You realize that it's time to stop hoping and waiting for something to change, or for happiness, safety and security to come galloping over the next horizon.You come to terms with the fact that he is not Prince Charming and you are not Cinderella and that in the real world there aren't always fairy tale endings (or beginnings for that matter). And that any guarantee must begin with YOU, and in the process a sense of serenity is born of acceptance.



You awaken to the fact that you are not perfect, and that not everyone will always love, appreciate or approve of who or what you are and it's OK. (They are entitled to their own views and opinions.) And you learn the importance of loving and championing yourself, and in the process a sense of new found confidence is born of self-approval.



You stop complaining and blaming other people for the things they did to you (or didn't do for you) and you learn that the only thing you can really count on is the unexpected. You learn that not everyone will always be there for you, and that it's not always about you. So, you learn to stand on your own and to take care of yourself and in the process a sense of safety and security is born of self-reliance.



You stop judging and pointing fingers and you begin to accept people as they are and to over look their shortcomings and human frailties and in the process a sense of peace and contentment are born of forgiveness.



You realize that much of the way you view yourself, and the world around you, is a result of all the messages and opinions that have been ingrained into your psyche. And you begin to sift through all the crap you've been fed about how you should behave, how you should look, how much you shouldn't weigh, what you should wear, where you should shop, what you should drive, how and where you should live, what you should do for a living, who you should sleep with, who you should marry, what you should expect of a marriage, the importance of having and raising children, or what you owe your parents.You learn to open up to new worlds and different points of view. And you begin reassessing and redefining who you are and what you really stand for.



You learn the difference between wanting and needing, and you begin to discard the doctrines and values you've outgrown, or should never have bought into to begin with, and in the process you learn to go with your instincts.



You learn that it is truly in giving that we receive and that there is power and glory in creating and contributing and you stop maneuvering through life merely as a “consumer” looking for you rnext fix.



You learn that principles such as honesty and integrity are not the outdated ideas of a by gone era, but the mortar that holds together the foundation upon which you must build a life.



You learn that you don’t know everything; it’s not your job to save the world and that you can’t teach a pig to sing. You learn to distinguish between guilt and responsibility, and the importance of setting boundaries and learning to say NO. You learn that the only cross to bear is the one you choose to carry, and that martyrs get burned at the stake.



Then you learn about love, romantic love and familial love. How to love, how much to give in love, when to stop giving, and when to walk away. You learn not to project your needs or your feelings onto a relationship. You learn that you will not be more beautiful, more intelligent, more lovable, or important because of the man or woman on your arm or the child that bears your name.



You learn to look at relationships as they really are and not as you would have them be. You stop trying to control people, situations, and outcomes.



You learn that just as people grow and change, so it is with love and you learn that you don't have the right to demand love on your terms, just to make you happy.



And, you learn that alone does not mean lonely. And you look in the mirror and come to terms with the fact that you will never be a size 5 or a perfect 10 and you stop trying to compete with the image inside your head and agonizing over how you “stack up.”



You also stop working so hard at putting feelings aside, smoothing things over, and ignoring your needs. You learn that feelings of entitlement are perfectly OK and that it is your right to want things and to ask for things that you want and that sometimes it is necessary to make demands.



You come to the realization that you deserve to be treated with love, kindness, sensitivity, and respect and you will not settle for less. And you allow only the hands of a lover who cherishes you, to glorify you with his or her touch and in the process you internalize the meaning of self-respect.



And you learn that your body really is your temple. You begin eating a balanced diet, drinking more water, and taking more time to exercise. You learn that fatigue diminishes the spirit and can create doubt and fear. So you take more time to rest. And, just as food fuels the body, laughter fuels our soul, so you take more time to laugh and to play.



You learn that, for the most part, in life you get what you believe you deserve and that much of life is a self-fulfilling prophecy.



You learn that anything worth achieving is worth working for, and that wishing for something to happen is different from working toward making it happen.



More importantly, you learn that in order to achieve success, you need direction, discipline, and perseverance. You also learn that no one can do it all alone and it’s OK to risk asking for help.



You learn that the only thing you must truly fear is the great robber baron of all time: FEAR itself. You learn to step right into and through your fears, because you know that whatever happens you can handle it, and to give in to fear is to give away the right to live life on your terms.



You learn to fight for your life and not to squander it living under a cloud of impending doom. You learn that life isn't always fair, you don't always get what you think you deserve, and that sometimes, bad things happen to unsuspecting, good people. On these occasions you learn not to personalize things. You learn that God isn't punishing you or failing to answer your prayers. It's just life happening.



And you learn to deal with evil in its most primal state: the ego. You learn that negative feelings such as anger, envy, and resentment must be understood and redirected, or they will suffocate the life out of you and poison the universe that surrounds you.



You learn to admit when you are wrong and to build bridges instead of walls.



You learn to be thankful and to take comfort in many of the simple things you take for granted, things that millions of people upon the earth can only dream about: A full refrigerator, clean running water, a soft warm bed, a long hot shower.



Slowly, you begin to take responsibility for yourself by yourself, and you try to make yourself a promise to never betray yourself and to never ever settle for less than your heart's desire. And you hang a wind chime outside your window so you can listen to the wind. And you make it a point to keep smiling, keep trusting, and to stay open to every wonderful possibility.



Finally, with courage in your heart and with God by your side, you take a stand, you take a deep breath, and you begin, as best as you can, to design the life you want to live.



[This is an abridged version of the poem.]



Peace and Joy,



Lynne Namka, Ed. D.


"Choice is focused intent. It triggers belief, attitude, feeling and decision-making. Choice is the keystone to creation and manifestation. Choice changes neural pathways. It can engage the unconscious to override the subconscious. Choice opens gateways to the future, to the possible and to your many possibilities."

Lazaris

Questions regarding the content of this newsletter, comments or written contributions can be directed to inspirationcontact@yahoo.com. Please remember that I cannot provide you with any advice of a personal nature. But help is out there somewhere! Do reach out and get a qualified professional to help you sort through your issues. Please check out my web site www.AngriesOut.com for ideas and numerous downloadable articles on a wide range of subjects. You can also click on the ‘Finding a Therapist’ link to take you to the section entitled, “Finding a Competent Therapist with Great Training.”

The Big Twelve of Life that Fate Brings You

Quotes for the Week:

"Live not as though there were a thousand years ahead of you. Fate is at your elbow; make yourself good while life and power are still yours."

Marcus Aurelius


“Destiny is, I think, nothing but a series of psychic knots that we tie with our fear...at some moment you must stop life and look into it. And as you go on dipping and rising in your inner Ganges, you undo the knots.”


Raja Rao The Serpent and the Rope


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The Big Twelve of Life that Fate Brings You

Lynne Namka, Ed. D. © 2010

A quote stopped me in my tracks this week causing me to pause and reflect. Gregory David Roberts, author of the novel Shantaram, said,


“Fate gives all of us three teachers, three friends, three enemies, and three great loves in our lives. But these twelve are always disguised and we can never know which one is which until we’ve loved them, left them or fought them.”


Shantaram is the author’s first book, an autobiographical novel about an Australian who escapes from prison and goes to Bombay, India where he becomes involved in the Indian Mafia of organized crime. Roberts is a philosopher and poet who writes from his heart while describing one of the most descriptively brutal and most loving books I’ve read. As a fugitive, the hero founds a free medical clinic in the cardboard shack slums of Bombay where he lives and falls in love with a mysterious woman. He’s always ready for a fight to the death and becomes involved in severe beatings, drugs, money laundering and passport smuggling of the black market. The beautiful generosity and loving connections of the Indian people living in poverty who open their hearts to friends and family are described along with the intense sights, smells and beauty of Mother India and its mix of many nationalities of people. It is a brutal, bloody book not for the faint of heart nor for the depressed, which tells of betrayal, damages of war and then the poetry of redemption, of love and forgiveness.


So back to the Robert’s quote, which is a doozy. Ponder on it and the twelve things that destiny, fate or your choices have brought to you in your life. Who are your three great teachers? Who are your three best friends? And your three enemies and three great loves? Stop and write these down before you read the rest of this.



Three great teachers:


Three good friends:


Three enemies:


Three great loves:


I would add the three greatest experiences that changed the way you think about and how you conduct your life.


And add a mistake or two that changed the course of your direction and what you learned.


Don’t be concerned if you can’t come up with the required number of three or if you have more than three for each category. The number isn’t important. Thinking about those who have had the biggest input to your psychological and spiritual development is the task here.


As I’ve had a quite complicated life, I had to divide my loves into three Heartbreaker loves and three Holy loves. The Heartbreakers were those people with whom I expended much mental and physical energy who gave me much pain along with the necessary life lessons I needed to learn to clear crucial karma. The three Holy loves are those people who are constant and true who gave me validation of me as a person and also joy.


When I asked the inner question of my Higher Self regarding my enemies, I was surprised by the answers of Self-Doubt, Neediness and Fear. Like the old comic strip character Pogo said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.” My enemies have been internal not external and in the end, only shortcomings to be addressed.


And while you are at it, stop and reflect on those people with whom you have had positive input into their life. Who have you impacted so that their life was changed for the better? Have you give back as much as has been given to you? Can’t think of anyone? There is still time for you to reach out and make someone else’s world a better place. Play it forward.


Now back to you. Your fate is there waiting in the wings brought on mostly by your thoughts, unresolved psychological issues and the choices you make. Why unresolved issues? The great Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung said, “The psychological rule says that when an inner situation is not made consciousness, it happens outside, as fate. That is to say, when the individual remains undivided and does not become conscious of his inner contradictions, the world must perforce act out the conflict and be torn in opposite haves.” What you don’t work out hits you smack dab in the face when you least expect it.


Ah yes, the opportunity to grow waits there and what is not worked out comes around again and again until you get it. Really get it. The evolutionary impulse towards growth is there pointing you towards integration. We call it the soul’s journey home.


Here’s another Roberts quote from the book:

“The cloak of the past is cut from patches of feeling, and rebus threads. Most of the time, the best we can do is wrap it around ourselves for comfort or drag it behind us as we struggle to go on. But everything has its cause and its meaning. Every life, every love, every action and feeling and thought has its reason and significance: its beginning, and the part it plays in the end. Sometimes, we do see. We see the past so clearly, and read the legend of its parts with such acuity, that every stitch of time reveals its purpose, and a kind of message is enfolded in it. Nothing in any life, no matter how well or poorly lived is wiser than failure or clearer than sorrow. And in the tiny, precious wisdom that they give to us, even those dread and hatred enemies, suffering and failure, have their reason and their right to be.”


Look to your failures and forgive yourself. Challenge your fears and dismiss the irrational ones. Most of them are illusions anyway. Learn from your mistakes. Thank those people, living or dead, who shaped and developed your psyche and hopeful outlook on the world. As you feel gratitude for those good influences given generously to you, reach out and engage in life and those current people around you. Celebrate those who truly love you and love them deeply in return. Go forward in your adventure toward your highest destiny.


Roberts ends his story with these words:

“…every human will has the power to transform its fate. I’d always thought that fate was unchangeable: fixed for every one of us at birth, and as constant as the circuit of the stars. But I suddenly realized that life is stranger and more beautiful than that. The truth is that, no matter what kind of game you find yourself in, no matter how good or bad the luck, you can change your life completely with a single thought or a single act of love….With love: the passionate search for a truth other than our own. With longing: the pure ineffable yearning to be saved. For so long as fate keeps waiting, we live on. God help us. God forgive us. We live on.”


Peace and joy,

Lynne

Giving up the Miserable Practice of Needing to be Perfect and Expecting Others to Be

Giving up the Miserable Practice of Needing
to be Perfect and Expecting Others to Be

Lynne Namka, Ed. D. © 2010


Expecting yourself or others to be perfect is an unfortunate way of thinking that is absolutely crazy making! Perfectionists have unrealistic expectations of themselves or others. Putting these unrealistic expectations on others creates frustration, anger and sometimes depression if you turn them back on yourself.

Perfectionistic thinking often manifests as judgments and “shoulds.” When you hear yourself making a "should judgment," you can tell yourself, “That’s only my ego nagging me with a should!” Modify your unyielding, unrealistic expectations for others—those absolutist shoulds, absolutes, have tos, ought tos and musts and make them preferences and wishes instead. These ways of viewing the world definitely breaks into your peace of mind and happiness.

Often perfectionistic thinking is passed down as a family generational theme. Shame of not measuring up to the unrealistic standards of the parents is passed from generation to generation. Critical parental behavior produces shame-prone children who then criticize themselves and others. When a child’s essential needs for stability, attention, affection, approval and validation were shamed, any time later in life when a valid need comes up, he might drop back into these old feelings.

The child who lives with constant criticism learns to hide his vulnerable feelings and his failures when the parents have high expectations of behavior. He or she feels rejected if the parent humiliates and punishes him for crying. The child learns to reject all aspects of himself including the wonderful ones. The rejected child believes that he must be really bad or his parents would accept and love him. He can stop trying to succeed as he might fail and he can’t bear the uncomfortable feelings that accompany failure. To protect his already fragile self-esteem, he procrastinates or gives up before he starts.

Failure is a necessary part of learning. Learning to cope with failure is a positive social skill that is necessary for success! How we cope with being thwarted on a goal defines whether we become a loser or a learner. The moment of failure presents a Y in the road: in one direction blaming either self or others or the other, problem solving. Once when I goofed up in a big way my boss said, “Lynne, what do we do about this?” Failure presents the opportunity for learning, for change and increased self-esteem.

Perfectionistic thoughts are obsessive lies of the ego that do you in. They can be stopped dead in their tracks through self-talk and The Emotional Freedom Technique. Reprogram your mind to KNOW that errors are for learning! Stop and ponder these quotes from wise minds that reflect on the value of learning through failure and giving up old, perfectionistic beliefs:

“Failure is not the worst thing in the world; the very worst is not to try.”

Anonymous

“One of the reasons people stop learning is that they become less and less willing to risk failure.”

John W. Gardner

“Persistent people begin their success where others end in failure.”

Edward Eggleston

“The way to succeed is to double your error rate.”

Thomas J. Watson

“Failure is the condiment that gives success its flavor.”

Truman Capote

“Failure should be our teacher, not our undertaker. Failure is delay, not defeat. It is a temporary detour, not a dead end. Failure is something we can avoid only by saying nothing, doing nothing and being nothing.”

Denis Waitley

“Better to do something imperfectly than to do nothing flawlessly.”

Robert Schuller

“Use what talent you possess: the woods would be very silent if no birds sang except those that sang best.”

Henry Van Dyke

“I think perfectionism is based on the obsessive belief that if you run carefully enough, hitting each stepping-stone just right, you won't have to die. The truth is you will die anyway and that a lot of people who aren't even looking at their feet are going to do a whole lot better than you, and have a lot more fun while they're doing it.”

Anne Lamott

“A diamond with a flaw is better than a common stone that is perfect.”

Chinese Proverb

“My imperfections and failures are as much a blessing from God as my successes and my talents and I lay them both at his feet.”

Gandhi

“I am perfectly imperfect and I allow this perfect imperfection in myself. I do strive for a standard of excellence in my work. That is perfectly right for me.”

Lynne Namka

“We are completely perfect, but we need a minor adjustment.”

Suzuki Roshi

“Your life will have a kind of perfection, although you will not be a saint. The perfection will consist in this: You will be very weak and you will make many mistakes; you will be awkward, for you will be poor in spirit and hunger and thirst for justice. You will not be perfect, but you will love. This is the gate and the way. There is nothing greater than love. There is nothing more true that love; nothing more real. So let us hand our lives over to love and seal the bond of love.”

Eberhard Arnold


Peace and joy,

Lynne

“Aim for success, not perfection. Never give up your right to be wrong, because then you will lose the ability to learn new things and move forward with your life. Remember that fear always lurks behind perfectionism. Confronting your fears and allowing yourself the right to be human can, paradoxically, make yourself a happier and more productive person. “

David M. Burns

[Lynne's website:] http://www.AngriesOut.com

Why Do Pencils Have Erasers? Why Do Computers Have Delete and Backspace Keys?

Why Do Pencils Have Erasers?
Why Do Computers Have Delete and Backspace Keys?

One of my favorite anonymous quotes on perfectionism is “No one is perfect; that’s why pencils have erasers.” A recent review of the literature on perfectionism showed two distinct kinds. Normal perfectionism is a “sense of pleasure from painstaking effort and desire to excel while feeling free to be as less precise as the situation demands.” There is a standard of excellence without the neurotic excessive worrying.

Neurotic perfectionists spend a lot of time spinning their wheels and scolding themselves or others! They fall apart and sink into low self-esteem if they make a mistake. They hold the erroneous belief that perfectionism will automatically bring rewards but it only generates worry and grief.

Neurotic perfectionists usually have a higher list of shoulds that they try to impose on their partners and children. Perfectionism is learned behavior; people who had critical, perfectionistic parents learn to be judgmental themselves. They can become angry when their own needs are not met.

Neurotic perfectionistic beliefs have the highest of expectations that cannot be gained. People who are critical and controlling of others because of their unusually high standards have high anxiety and irritability within. They try to keep their nervous feelings down by trying to control the environment and the people in it. They harbor faulty beliefs that certain people are bad, stupid, evil, or do things wrong and it is their moral duty to correct them. They try to impose their values on others in order to keep their own nervous feelings at bay.

Critical statements start with the word “You” followed by an accusation and the insistence that someone else is doing something wrong. They are blame statements. They are all a form of the need for control which insists that “I get to tell you what to do.” Loss of connection and intimacy is always a by-product of the shoulds and demands of perfectionism.

My Critical Part has been Out Lately

“Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor,” said Anne Lamott. Here is an exercise to help you look at your patterns of judgment and criticism. Write out the answers to help identify your beliefs that make you a controlling person.

One area that I criticize my partner/friend/child is:

When I feel that my needs are not met in this area, the unhealthy ways that I cope are:

What can I do to release my irrational idea that my happiness depends on you changing?

I am willing to observe and examine my behaviors that I’m upset with in you such as:

I pay attention. I interrupt my critical thoughts and words by: (Observation, introspection and meditation, Thought stoppage, The Emotional Freedom Technique, Deep breathing, etc.)

I perceive that others have criticized me for:

Some of the criticism is just. I am willing to acknowledge that I:

I am willing to observe and examine these behaviors that are upsetting to others:

When you come to the fork in the road after an upsetting incident, you can go to blaming or to problem solving. So look to your beliefs and how they make you miserable or contented. The need to control another person’s actions can be understood, analyzed and channeled into higher-level responses which promote healthy interactions for all involved. The next time that you have an unrealistic expectation of someone and a subsequent angry outburst, ask yourself two questions. Am I just acting out of perfectionistic habit needs? Did my action celebrate life or harm life?

Remember, if you reach for the stars and beat yourself up for not getting them, you will end up clutching at air and being pretty darned depressed!

Challenge your negative thoughts and impractical and unworkable demands. Anytime you do something to calm yourself instead of running the turmoil created by your critical nature ego, you are doing affect regulation. Anytime you tell yourself something helpful, you are doing positive self-talk and Thought Stoppage, thus increasing self-esteem. Yeah! You are on the road to positive thinking and living. Author Wayne Dyer says, “When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change.” Working your mind works. It only works when you work it!

Peace and joy,

Lynne Namka, Ed. D. © 2010



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Ideas taken from the research article, The destructiveness of perfectionism. Implications for the treatment of depression, by Prof. Sidney J. Blatt and The Perfectionist’s Script for Self-defeat (article) by David D. Burns.


My book, Good Bye Ouchies and Grouchies, Hello Happy Feelings: EFT for Kids of All Ages has a companion book. Teaching Emotional Intelligence to Children: Fifty Fun Activities for Parents, Teachers and Therapists gives lesson plans plus EFT tapping statements. Go to http://members.aol.com/AngriesOut/newbooks.htm#ouchies to order the set of both books at a discounted rate.