(THE BOOK) Chapter 18: Survival

All the factors just described — family, trauma, socialization, culture — combine in the human mind to drive controlling behavior.

And the ultimate goal of that behavior is the most primitive and stubborn of all human goals:

Life itself.

I refer here not just to physical survival, though certainly much of our controlling (like when we’re driving a car or battling an illness) has that as its aim.

I mean emotional, psychological, and social survival as well.

We cannot help but believe control is essential to these, too.

Thus it is emotional survival that forces children to appease their narcissistic parents, since on the deepest level they know they need parental love, nurturance and protection in order to live.

It is psychological survival that demands trauma survivors limit their exposure to threatening triggers, since the alternative — constantly recurring states of fight-or-flight — would lead to intolerable stress and the disintegration of their minds.

And it is social survival that requires each of us to absorb and obey the dictates of the society to which we belong, since – again, on the deepest of levels – we know that we cannot last long without acceptance by the tribe.

For all these reasons we each come to believe that control is essential to our lives.

This conviction is so unconscious and inescapable that it makes getting control feel like a matter of life and death.  It’s why even the idea of losing control can produce anxiety, and why control addiction plays like a silent soundtrack behind every human experience.

And where does it come from, this conviction that we must control or die?

Mainly from the structure of our minds.

 

How to spot monkeytraps

.

How are your holidays going?  

Thought so.  

Bert and I guessed you could use this refresher:

.

In Asia they trap monkeys by placing bait in a heavy jar with a narrow neck.   The monkey smells the bait, reaches in to grab it, and traps himself by refusing to let go.

A psychological monkeytrap is any situation that triggers you into compulsive controlling — into holding on when you really should let go.

And how can you tell when you’re at risk of entrapment?

Three tips:

.

Tip 1:

Notice where you’re uncomfortable.

We’re controlling whenever we need or want to change some piece of reality instead of accepting it or adapting to it as is.  And we’re most likely to want to change realities that make us uncomfortable.  So it makes sense that our discomfort zones are where we’re most likely to get monkeytrapped.

Bert:  Me, I hate rejection.  So I’m most controlling with people I think might reject me.  I hide feelings I think will upset them, pretend to agree when I really don’t, laugh at stupid jokes, avoid confronting behavior I dislike, try to read their minds, and so on and so on.  Keeps me busy.      

. 

Tip 2:

Notice where you’re stuck.

Stuck as in not learning, healing or growing — struggling with the same damn problem over and over.  You know you’re monkeytrapped whenever you find yourself doing what you already know doesn’t work.

Bert:  All that controlling I just described traps me because it (a) stops me from being myself, which (b) prevents me from ever getting accepted as myself, which (c)  keeps me chronically scared of rejection, which brings me right back to (a).  Like riding an endless merry-go-round.

. 

Tip 3:

Notice where you’re scared.

Like all addictions, compulsive controlling is anxiety-driven.  We stay monkeytrapped because we’re scared to do anything else.  Often even the thought of giving up control in such situations is enough to scare us silly.

Bert:  Took me a long time to see that controlling doesn’t work.  Or it does, but only for five minutes.  Then another scary thing comes along and I have to control that.  And life being what it is, there’s no end to scary things.  So as an anxiety-reduction tactic controlling is a total flop.

 

The most frightened people are the most controlling people, and the most controlling people stay the most frightened.

 

Gasoline

One classic symptom of control addiction is enabling.

Enabling is anything you do to solve a problem that ends up making the problem worse.

Like trying to put out a fire with gasoline.

Or scratching a rash left by poison ivy.

Or trying to get an alcoholic to stop drinking by hiding their booze or nagging them to enter treatment.

Or trying to improve communication with your kids by forcing them to talk to you.

Or trying to improve your marriage by reminding your spouse how disappointing and inadequate he/she is.

The forms it takes are infinite.

What they all have in common, though — and what makes them so difficult to stop — is that they gratify a short-term need.

The need to do something.

We hate feeling helpless.  We hate facing the fact that some problems we simply cannot solve.

So we cling to the illusion of control.

Maybe this time it will work, we tell ourselves.

Or Maybe if I try it this way.

Or This is too important.  I can’t do nothing.

Pass the gasoline.

Group anxiety

Most people are anxious when they first join a therapy group.

Some take a long time to get over their anxiety.  A few never do.

Usually they don’t understand why.

It’s because on some level they expect to be treated in group as they were treated in their family of origin.

If they were abused or neglected as kids, they expect the group to abuse or neglect them.  If they were controlled or criticized or rejected or shamed, they expect the same treatment again.

For this reason even the idea of group is terrifying to some.

But it’s also what makes group such a powerful therapeutic tool.

Because when an emotionally wounded person joins group and nothing bad happens — when instead they receive the attention, acceptance and caring their family couldn’t provide — they have what’s called a corrective emotional experience:

Some deep part of them starts to realize they’re not kids anymore, and that not everyone is like the people who disappointed or hurt them when they were.

It’s a realization I’ve seen change lives.

 

Impasse

I’m stuck.

Part of me says Yes, do it.  Do it now. 

Another part says No, I can’t.  Or No, I’m scared.

Gestaltists call this stuckness impasse: the point at which you stop yourself from moving forward because you’re afraid you won’t survive the attempt.

Scared, for example, of ending the marriage.  Quitting the job.  Starting the business.  Writing the book.  Expressing the feeling.  Telling the truth.

Such stuckness always involves old fears, triggered in some part of me that hasn’t grown up.

That part so clearly remembers being dependent, helpless and/or scared of punishment that it hasn’t discovered I’m grown up now, and in charge of my own life.

 “We are continually projecting threatening fantasies onto the world,” Fritz Perls wrote, “and these fantasies prevent us from taking the reasonable risks which are part and parcel of growing and living.”

The surprising thing about an impasse?

It’s almost always imaginary.  It doesn’t exist in reality.

Push back against the fear and it tends to vanish, like a nightmare does when you turn on the bedroom light.

Answer

To respond means to answer. Responsibility means the ability to do that, answer life and its problems appropriately, intelligently and effectively. Yet control addiction has essentially the same response (I must control this) to every problem, regardless of circumstances or how well it’s worked in the past.  That’s neither appropriate, effective nor responsible.  It’s crazy.

 

***

From Bert’s Therapy, session 5:

 

You face a choice of symptoms.

Read the rest here.

Wobbly

I’m two days into vacation, and it’s not going well.

When I try to rest I feel guilty.  I’m at home, and I look around and see all the shit that needs to be done.

Then I try doing some of it and end up feeling angry.  I mean, I’m supposed to be on vacation.

All of which reminds me of the Zen proverb:

Sitting,
just sit.
Walking,
just walk.
Above all,
don’t wobble.

Now, I know this.  I know that when you’re not paying full attention you feel fragmented.  That when you’re not where you are, you’re nowhere.

But knowing doesn’t help.  Because I’m also like most people.  I spent my life detached from reality, dwelling not in the moment but in tomorrow (What do I have to do? And when?) or yesterday (What did I forget?).  

Like most people, I spend my life wobbling.

So hard to get in touch with here/now.  To stop doing and just be.

I just installed a mindfulness bell on my computer which rings periodically to remind me to visit here/now.

Every time I hear it I get annoyed.  (Monkey mind hates to be told to shut up.)

But then I stop what I’m doing, close my eyes, breathe in and out three times.

And for just a moment I enter the room I’m already in.  I feel my body, and the air around it, and hear the sounds in that air, and I settle down a little bit, and feel a little less fragmented.

For just a moment, I’m unwobbly.

Labels

In times of crisis she calls herself names.

“I’m so stupid,” she’ll say.  Or “I’m crazy.”

But when I offer her a diagnosis – suggest she has an anxiety disorder, say – she rejects it:

“I don’t like labels.”

Puzzling.  What are stupid and crazy if not labels?

It reminds me of something many addicts say when I suggest medication:

“I don’t want to need a pill to make me feel good.”

I hear this regularly from people already dependent on pot, street drugs or alcohol.

How explain this inconsistency?

To some people, accepting a diagnosis or medication feels like a loss of control.

I sympathize.  Nobody likes to feel defined or directed by somebody else.

But resisting diagnosis and treatment usually leaves such people feeling neither freer nor stronger.

Just crappier.

Not more in control, but more helpless.

Another reminder of what I call the First Paradox.

The greater your need to feel in control, the less in control you’re likely to feel.

Refocusing

Fourth in the series

Notes on Recovery

 

Our need to refocus comes from realizing the real reason we try to control stuff:

We’re trying to control how we feel.

We’re especially trying to manage anxiety.

Think about it.  What scares you most?  Criticism?  Failure?  Rejection?  Abandonment?  Humiliation?  Physical pain or discomfort?

That’s what you feel most compelled to control.

Compulsive means anxiety-driven.   Whenever I act like a control addict – for example,

~ hide my real self from other people,

~ hide my true feelings from myself,

~ try to impress, coerce or manipulate others,

~ insist things be done my way,

~ caretake friends or family members,

~ worry endlessly about the future, or

~ try to make my environment just as I want it to be

– I’m being driven by some anxiety about what will happen if I don’t do these things.

Recovery means finding another way to manage this anxiety.

Which is where refocusing comes in.

When I refocus, I shift my attention from Out There to In Here.  I redefine the problem from some external trigger (X looks mad) to my own reaction (I’m scared of X).

I  step back from that reaction and realize that, to feel safe again, I really don’t need to control X.  I just need to change my reaction.  If I can do that, X’s anger stops being a problem.

Changing my reaction to stuff is what allows me to stop trying to control it.

Next: The three questions

* * *

Previous posts in this series:

(A sort of preface:) Tricky

1. Bottom 

2. Power

3. Plan B

 

 

 

Harbor

Six women, crying.

All moms or grandmothers, and all worried about a kid.

One kid is gay and her parents are rejecting her.  One’s being fed junk food and left alone all day with tv.  One (a big one) is a germophobe whose marriage is in jeopardy.  One (another big one) drinks too much.  And the last flies into rages when he can’t get his way.

Anxiety, frustration, guilt and helplessness slowly fill the group room like a swimming pool.

And behind each story is one question: What can I do about this?  And the same frightened answer: I can’t do anything.

“Okay,” I say finally.  “Ready for some good news?”

They look at me.

“Not the answer you’re looking for, probably.  And not where you’re looking for it.  Not out there, among the people you love and want to rescue and the problems you hate and want to solve.”

I get up from my chair and go to a mobile hanging in one corner.  It’s my Seafood Mobile, all fish, crabs and starfish.  I flick a tuna with my finger. The whole mobile bounces.

“This is a family,” I say.  “See what happens when one member’s in trouble?  The trouble migrates throughout the system.  Affects everyone.  Got that?”

They nod.

“Now watch.”  I hold the tuna between my thumb and forefinger.  The mobile calms down.  “This is what happens when one member stabilizes or heals.  That healing migrates throughout the system too.”

I sit down again.

“You’ve no control over these problems.  But you also have more power than you know.   You can be the calm fish.  You can help stabilize the system.

“Remember when you were kids?  Remember the adults that helped you the most?  They weren’t the anxious, angry or desperate ones. Not the ones who scolded or punished or rescued.

“They were the ones who reassured you, encouraged you, praised you, helped you feel good about yourselves.  Who modeled calmness, acceptance, or faith.  Who helped convince you – because they really believed it – that Everything Will Be Okay.”

“That’s what you can bring to your families.

“Your kids and grandkids are each in their own little rowboat.  You can’t row it for them.  Can’t stop the storm or calm the waters.  You don’t have that kind of control.

“But if you learn how to calm yourselves without controlling, you can offer them a safe harbor.  Model faith that Everything Will Be Okay.  And provide an emotional space where they can pull in, drop oars, catch their breath, regain hope.

“Not a small thing.”

Knife

.

* * *

Since feeling out of control

is uncomfortable,

it makes me seek more control.

.

The more I seek control,

the more sensitive I become

to control issues.

.

The more sensitive I become

to control issues, the more often

I feel out of control.

.

Which makes me

uncomfortable.

.

Since feeling out of control

is uncomfortable, it makes me…

.

You know.

Addict

(Bert speaking.)

I’ve been addicted to control for as long as I can remember.

That is, for as long as I can remember I’ve been trying to force reality — people, places, things, even myself — to match the pictures in my head of how I want reality to be.

I do this constantly.

I do it unconsciously.  Which means I usually don’t know when I’m doing it.

And I do it compulsively.  Which means I get really really anxious when I can’t get control.

I expect to stay an addict until I die.

Yes, I’m in recovery.  But that just means I’m less controlled by my need for control than I used to be, just as recovering alcoholics are less controlled by their need to drink.  They’ll always be alcoholics, though, and I’ll always be a control addict.

I’ll always feel this urge to control stuff.  Even when I know it’s crazy to try.

It’s crazy, I’ve learned, because control is largely an illusion.

Sure,  it’s not always an illusion.  If I pour sugar in my coffee the coffee gets sweeter.  If I pull the steering wheel to the right my car will reliably turn right.

But the world is larger than sugar and steering wheels.  And the truth is that, beyond these concrete ways of changing my immediate circumstances, much of my controlling operates more on the level of wishful thinking.

Why?  Because most of my controlling is an attempt to control feelings and relationships.

And feelings have no steering wheel.  And in relationships sugar doesn’t always work.

Let me explain.

Say I have a feeling I don’t want.  Say I feel inadequate.  But it’s uncomfortable to feel that, and I also worry that if you see that I feel inadequate you may agree with me, which would make me feel worse.  So I hide my feeling, from you and from myself.  I work hard at presenting myself as adequate, even superior. (For an example, see “Bert’s mask.”)  And let’s say it works: I convince you I’m superior.  I have successfully controlled your perception of me.

Do I feel better?

Not so much.

At least, not for long.  Why?  Because I know it’s an act, a pretense.  I’ve basically fooled you about me, and I can’t forget that.  So whatever approval I get from you is essentially meaningless.  And I end up feeling both inadequate and phony.

See how that works?

Another example:

Say I’m mad at you, but afraid to show it.  I’m scared you might get mad back at me, which would make me unhappy.

So I hide my anger from you.  I bury it.

But overcontrolling feelings tends to be bad for me.  Feelings are meant to be expressed, not contained.  Released, not stored up.  So burying my anger makes me uncomfortable.  Constipated.  Pressured.  Uneasy.  Anxious.  And when I do it long and habitually enough, I get depressed.  I.e., chronically unhappy.

How’s that for irony?

Why doesn’t control work better in the realms of feeling and relationships?

Because at the heart of this addiction lies an annoying but inescapable paradox:

The more control I need, the less in control I feel.

* * *

 

The Uncomfort Zone

There’s a place in your life that’s neither light nor dark, warm nor cold, where things don’t quite work but where you stay because it’s familiar.

You stay because you know this place like the back of your hand, every dark corner, every lump in the carpet, every draft. 

You stay because you can find your away around it with your eyes closed. Which, in fact, is just what you do.

There’s pain here, but it’s the dull, tolerable kind.  The kind you know well.  The kind you’ve known forever.  The kind you cling to rather than risk something worse.  

That’s the signpost up ahead.

Next stop: the Uncomfort Zone.

* * *

Albert, 58, has been married three times.  His first two marriages ended in acrimonious divorce.  His third marriage is two years old, and his wife recently ended their couples counseling in tearful frustration.   Albert continues in therapy without her.  He reports their life has deteriorated into a series of hurtful arguments alternating with long silences.  Last week she told him she’d leave if she had someplace to go.  I ask how he thinks our work together is going.  “Really well,” he says.  “It’s very interesting.  I feel like I’m learning a lot.”

* * *

Barry, 38, sits on my sofa with his wife Beth.  They are new clients.  I ask why they’ve come.  Beth tells me Barry’s individual therapist thinks couples work is necessary.  “What led you to individual therapy?” I ask Barry.  He frowns.  “I have issues,” he says.  “You drink, and you play video games, and that’s all you do,” the wife says.   Barry frowns harder.  “Do you have a problem with alcohol?” I ask Barry.  “I have issues,” he repeats.  The wall appears impenetrable.  After twenty minutes I suggest Barry wait outside while I talk to Beth alone.  He brightens, stands and walks quickly to the door.  Then he turns back to his wife.  “Can I borrow your iPad?” he asks.

* * *

Carly, 43 and a social worker, is more depressed this week than last.  Last week she was more depressed than the week before.  This slide began last year, with her transfer out of the counseling job she loved into an administrative job she hates, under a supervisor she considers an idiot.  Now she visits her doctor monthly to request tweaks of her medication.  Asked what’s depressing her, she shrugs: “No idea.”   I tell her that I think what she needs is work — real, meaningful work she enjoys, that brings out the best in her and makes her feel valuable.  I suggest she network, go on interviews, or consider private practice.  I also suggest she pursue the hobbies — cooking, dancing, yoga — she once used to feed and express herself.  She shakes her head.  “I’m too tired for any of that now,” she sighs.  “I need to save my energy for the stupid job.”   

* * *

Debbie, 23, is crying.  “You don’t love me,” she tells her boyfriend David, who’s sitting beside her on my sofa looking miserable.  After three months of Debbie complaining of his silence and begging him to be more open with her, David has finally risked telling her about something he dislikes in their relationship.  “I’m not good with words,” he said.   “We never talked in my family.  So when I try I get nervous.  I’m scared to hurt your feelings.  And the more you push me to talk, the scareder I get.”  “Good for you, David,” I say.  “I know how hard that was.”  Debbie wipes her nose with a tissue.  “So you don’t really love me,” she repeats.

* * * 

Eddie, 42, is angry at his son Evan.  “Everything scares him,” he tells me.  “He’s scared to go to school.  Scared he’ll fail Math.  Scared to try out for teams.  Scared to ask a girl out.  What the fuck?”  He shakes his head.  I ask what happens when he tries to talk to Evan, who’s 15.  “What do you think?” Eddie snorts.  “He acts scared of me.”  I ask what Evan’s fear looks like.  “He sort of shrinks into himself.  Gets quiet.  Avoids eye contact.  I can tell he just wants me to shut up and leave him alone.”  “How’s that make you feel?” I ask.  “Furious,” Eddie says.  “I’m his father.  I’m trying to help him.”  “And what do you say?” I ask.  “I say, ‘I’m your father.  I’m trying to help you.  What the fuck?'”

* * * 

We read the world wrong and say that it deceives us.           ~ Rabindrath Tagore

I’ve heard someone say that our problems aren’t the problem; it’s our solutions that are the problem.  ~ Anne Lamott  

When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. ~ Abraham Maslow

Only a concerted effort to sort out the specific nature of our personal programming can offer hope of change, of new choices. ~ James Hollis

The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them. ~ Albert Einstein

 

* * *

 

Overheard at the House:

 

I’m probably addicted to control too.  The way I’ve attempted to control things is to pull further and further within myself and my own world.  I got hurt at work.  Now I don’t work.  I got hurt by friends.  Now I don’t have friends. I’m hurt by family.  So, I’m very careful when I’m with them.  But, I don’t feel safer.  I can’t control myself.  Now, I’m with myself more than ever before!  I don’t think I thought that through…

 

Monkey House. 

Click here ^

and join the conversation.

 

* * *

 

Coming soon:

From the monkeys who brought you 

Bert’s Therapy, The Tribe and Monkey House,

a new cartoon strip about secret thoughts:

 

The Dark

   

The tribe: Expectations

 

Most people feel anxious in group without really understanding why.

1

2

member 1

3

4

1=

2=

Personally I think it’s because, on some deep level, the group reminds us of our family of origin.

1

2

member 2

3

4

5

 

2=

And we expect it to treat us just as our family did.

1

2

member 3

3

4

1=

2a

=

So tell me.  If this group were your family, what would you be expecting now?

1

2

member 4

3

4

1=

2=

therapist 5

1

2

To get hit.

3

4

5

6

1=

2=

1

2

3

4

5

1

To get humiliated.

3=

\

 

therapist 7

1

2

To be told to shut up.

3

4

5

1=

2=

1=

therapist 8

1

2

3

4

To be ignored.

3

4

1=

2=

Pink?  What would you expect?

1

2

member 9

3

4

5

1=

2=

therapist 10

1

2

3

All of the above.

3

4

5

1=

2=

Jeez.

1

2

member 11

3

4

5

6

1=

2=

So you all have good reason to feel anxious in this room.

1

2

member 12

3

4

5

1=

 

2=

But I have to ask Pink:

1

2

member 13

3

4

5

1=

2=a

 

How’d you work up the courage to even come here?

1

2

member 14

3

4

5

1=

2=

therapist 15

1

2

3

Two beers, half a pizza, and a Vicodin.

3

4

5

6

7

* * *

  

Group therapy. 

In Hebrew. 

“Hello, this is Fear Management. 

“My name is Moni, and I too have a phobia. 

“I have a fear of shouting. 

“You know, a, h, h, h, exclamantion mark, ‘ahhh’!

“At this point I suggest we all tell about ourselves…” 

 

Excerpt from the Israeli TV show “Ktzarim”:  Five troubled people (that description includes the group leader) meet for group therapy.  In Hebrew with English subtitles (2:22).

 

* * *

 

Overheard at the House:

Eventually, and every time, I used to drive my current partner insane with my hang ups and he broke off the relationship….

So I decided only I could change and needed to put my – sorry to be blunt – infantile behaviour aside and choose blind trust, no matter the outcome….

Result: I came to accept that my life is my life and not dependent on anyone else for survival or safety – and in a way I was going to be alone, with or without a partner: it’s part of the human condition….

 

Come. 

Join the conversation. 

Monkey House.

Because we’re all monkeys on this bus.

 

 

 

 

 

Session 22: Bull (part 2)

bert

1

2

3

4

Remember when I complimented you on developing some empathy?

1

2

3

4

Yeah.

1

2

3

4

I may have spoken too soon.

1

2

3

4

What the hell is “empathy,” anyway?

1

2

3

4

Awareness of another person’s feelings.

1

2

3

4

And I lack that.

1

2

3

4

Apparently.  But it’s not your fault.

1

2

3

4

bert.

1

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3

4

You’re a man.  Most men are trained to be emotional dunderheads.

1

2

3

4

“Dunderhead”?

1

2

3

4

Emotionally stupid.

1

2

3

4

How does that happen?

1

2

3

4

Well, we teach men to ignore or hide their feelings…

1

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3

4

bert

1

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3

4

…so they can go to war and go to work and do other stuff that feelings tend to interfere with.

1

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3

4

Because big boys don’t cry.

1

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3

4

Exactly.

1

2

3

4

bert 10

1

2

3

4

And once you lose touch with your own feelings…

1

2

3

4

bert (11)

1

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4

…it’s hard to be sensitive to anyone else’s.

1

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Like a wife’s.

1

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4

Yes.

1

2

3

4

So she’s right.  I am insensitive to her feelings.

1

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4

So it would seem.

1

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4

Now I feel like a jerk.

1

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3

4

I wouldn’t say that.  Just think of yourself as…

1

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4

bert (15)

1

2

3

4

…a bull in a china shop.

1

2

(To be continued.)

x

x

* * *

Want more?

Having spent half his life trying to find fulfillment outside himself, he awakens to discover that it has not worked. For the first time in his life, a man may turn inward for answers.

He may begin to realize that his unhappiness is not caused by his failure to find the right woman or the right career, but by who he is and the way he is living his life.

Rather than blame others, he may ask, “How have I caused this to happen? Perhaps I need to change and develop greater self-awareness before I can have a healthy relationship or a satisfying career.”

This is a very difficult and courageous step for a man to take. Having successfully mastered his life on the outside, he is now forced to acknowledge that he needs help to explore difficulties encountered in his inner life.

From Real men do therapy by Jerry Magaro.

* * *

Most men grow up with an emptiness inside them.  Call it father hunger, call it male deprivation, call it personal insecurity, it’s the same emptiness.

When positive masculine energy  — a male mode of feeling — is not modeled from father to son, it creates a vacuum in the souls of men.  And into that vacuum demons pour.

Among other things, they seem to lose the ability to know how to read situations and people correctly.

Richard Rohr, in From wild man to wise man: Reflections on male spirituality.