responsibility

[Adam Blatner]

Dear Regina, well said!
    Now I think what we need to do---or my interest, at least---is to identify specifically the nonverbal cues that lead to the other person feeling "eviscerated" or pressured. I think this can happen due to a number of themes:
    actual words---semantics--- "you should"  "this must"  or talking about the catastrophes that will happen if one doesn't ... whatever...
    intensity of voice, steadiness of eyes ("boring into you"), finger wagging, pointing, poking, fists, slowing down pace and emphasizing words
    raising voice volume, shouting, yelling, screaming  (Dilbert cartoon line: The most insane person in the group gets his or her way)
      .. etc.

   This also overlaps with the topic of projective identification, the communicability of anxiety, urgency

          There's an interesting parental transference here: Our sense that others (as parents) should know, do know how to fix it (and it's near unthinkably anxiety-producing to consider that others really do not know!). 
       Knowing involves having a mixture of an infrastructure of skills, knowledge, ideas that in fact most folks lack.
           We must also open to the idea (horrifying as it may be) that no humans presently know the elements needed to achieve the end.

      So taking responsibility involves a willingness to engage with full humility, but not a feeling that it is our "responsibility" to "get other people" to listen, be interested, or do. 
      (I've found that interesting isn't a quality of the object of contemplation but of the contemplator. I had this wrong for years and as a result have annoyed people a lot. Sigh.)

       Warmly, Adam
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: REGINA SEWELL 
  To: list at grouptalkweb.org 
  Sent: Monday, May 19, 2008 11:25 PM
  Subject: Re: List Digest, Vol 23, Issue 12


  Adam, Peter,

  I was caught by the discussion of NVC, Moreno and responsibility, perhapsbecause I have internalized the idea that it's my job to try to save the world and have also been to a number of Non-Violent Communication workshopsand have been frustrated by their intellectualized version of empathy. What I have experienced is that it works well if the person doing theempathy is really good at it - has really worked at it....  but it'sreally hard to think oneself into that place of empathy... and it's somuch faster double and do role reversal.  It also makes one feel morevulnerable.  

  But I also get the balance that Rosenberg is trying to bring.  How manyof us as psychodramatist or from our spiritual or political positionsgo out and try to save the world?  And how many of us, in our effortsto save the world, get frustrated with people, snap at people, act likeassholes, dissolve into control freaks and in general don't play wellwith others?  What I understand Marshall Rosenberg to be saying (and Iam filtering this through a Buddhist lens, is that if you are not beinghonest and authentic with yourself, if you are not getting your needsfor love, attention, contribution, authenticity, etc. (whatever the bigneed - or as one NVC trainer from Cleveland whose name I'm blanking onhas translated to mean values - met, you are not going to be fullypresent and what you offer will be hurtful to both you and detrimentalto your cause.  

  Having done time in the trenches of the radical feminist movement, Iunderstand this concept.  I watched people talk about how can't expectto change the world using the Master's tools and then rip people toshreds because they hadn't found ways to get their needs met.  GloriaSteinem talked about this in "Revolution From Within" more than adecade ago.  The heart of Marshall Rosenberg's work, hokey as it maysound, is living from the heart....  really being in the heartspace...   relating to other people from that space.  If you try tochange the world from the "head" space, you will hurt people.  

  I recently met someone who is an amazing person. She has a passion forchemical dependency treatment.  She has built an chemical dependencytreatment agency... a huge agency with a number of branches.. thatoffers affordable treatment to those in need. She has passion for thisfield.  She wants to help.   I also know people who have worked for heragency.  It's brutal.  Self care is not a priority.  She is so lost inher vision that she doesn't create a space for her staff to take careof themselves and people burn out.  I left the meeting feeling like Ihad just had a vulture eviscerate my liver, my pancreas and my smallintestine.  How do you expect people who are pushed beyond their edgeto be able to do effective therapy?  How do we expect ourselves to doeffective therapy if we don't practice what we preach in terms of selfcare... in terms of meeting our own needs.

  It's all about balance.  And honesty.  And we've all probably come intocontact with someone the DSM 4 whatever would define as anarcisist.....  so it's easy to be a bit gun shy about taking care ofneeds...But if a person's real needs for connection and whatever aremet (aka they experience their needs being met through surplus reality)the theory goes that they won't have to act in ways that are sooffputting.  

  Peace,
  regina sewell, Ph.D.



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