Posts tagged “choice theory”
July 4, 2020 7 Comments

Rebel or Robot Can’t Be the Only Option

Parenting is hard. This is especially true if parents aren’t clear on the details of human design. When key details are clear, being a parent can be meaningful and fulfilling. When the key details are not clear and not put into practice, parenting is often confrontational and discouraging. So what are the key details?

Let’s start with what might be the keyest of the keys – human beings are born with an overarching feature called internal control. Another way of saying this is that humans are designed for self-control. Fairly soon in their young lives, little humans will experiment with their internal control potential. And the thing about internal control is that, by design, it does not like to be externally controlled. When people, especially children, resist being controlled they are acting, to some degree, in alignment with their design as human beings.

Given this tension between internal control and external control, parents find themselves in a conundrum. They want to control their kids, but they also want them to grow up to be independent and strong. They want to control, even as their kids are designed to not be controlled.

Parents want their kids to do exactly as they are told, to eat the eggplant that is put before them, to do their homework and get good grades, and to get into Stanford. They want their kids to act safely at all times and to be in bed by 10:00 PM with no head phones.

And yet, parents want their kids to mature into people who know how to rightly discriminate, to judge wisely, to think and act according to well-chosen principles, rather than simply following the opinions of others. Such independence and strength develops out of an atmosphere of freedom and support, though. Parental control can actually delay and, at times, impair the ability to be thoughtful and independent.

Humans are different from other animals in that, because we are designed with internal control, we require a great deal of support, instruction, and guidance early on. Other animals possess, to greater and lesser extent, instincts that even from birth fits them to survive and live. Turtles don’t have the qualities of mind to experience fun or love, but they break out of their shells and crawl along the sand to the sea with everything they need – mostly the instinct to swim and to eat – to survive and grow. Human babies are born with incredible abilities of mind, but must be supported as they are taught about their abilities and how to use them.

The nature of this support becomes rather important. All human beings, including new, little humans, possess internal control systems, and will balk when faced with the control of a system outside of itself. So big humans, adults, and parents specifically, must seek ways to influence their children without becoming involved with excess control. Some will mutter, “Bah, humbug,” to the admonition to influence rather than control kids, but the naysayers’ disgust will not change the reality of the elements of internal control.

External control is useful for machines, but we risk harming our connection with others whenever we use it on humans, especially those with whom we are close. An answering machine can be programmed to answer a call at the fourth ring, and will do so every time without question or complaint. If all you want to do is record messages then a machine can, in most cases, do the trick. Humans, on the other hand, are not meant to respond like machines, and in fact constantly question, process, and predict the circumstances in the world around them. These abilities enable them to function in both a predictable and unpredictable world, a complex world in which many other humans are also seeking to successfully negotiate reality.

When it comes to preparing kids for life it gets back to a central question – What Do I Really Want? Do I want my kids to be able to take full advantage of their personal internal control systems, independent, capable, and confident? Or do I want to control my kids and have them jump when I say ‘jump’ and sit when I say ‘sit?’

If control is the focus, then there are at least two significant risks to consider-

The first risk is that a child or teenager, being of internal control, will rebel, whether actively or passively. Teenagers that are “active rebellers” are the ones who get in your face and argue about your ridiculous expectation or rule, before tromping to their room and slamming their door. Teenagers that are “passive rebellers” are those who wait until you are not around, and then will behave exactly how they want, regardless of your admonitions and threats. Adult attempts at control that foster rebellion, whether active or passive, is the motivation behind a great deal of teen at-risk behavior.

The second risk is that a child or teenager will comply, obeying the commands or expectations out of fear. Rebellious behavior is absent, but so is the development of a backbone. Such children may appear like well-drilled soldiers, but they lack in independence and grow up doubting their own capability, and in some cases, grow up doubting even their own opinion.

Neither of these control paths is the goal. Rebel or robot can’t be the only options.

All human beings would be served by learning about the details of internal control design. Not knowing these details is like playing in a game in which we do not know the object of the game or the rules that govern play. Parents especially, though, need to understand the concepts of internal control. What follows are a few areas to keep in mind. Because you are reading this post you are well on your to achieving the first area, that being awareness.

+ Become aware of internal control design as it relates to human motivation and behavior. Internal control systems do not like to be controlled by other systems. The fact that children and students are guided by internal control is a strength, not a flaw.

+ Compassionately apply the concept of Gradual Release of Responsibility. This educational term is kept in mind by teachers as they prepare students to independently use a new academic or creative skill. Teachers will scaffold learning, thus providing support for students until they can do the skill on their own. Parents can benefit, too, from the Gradual Release of Responsibility. A three year old child can’t be given a lot of responsibility, but s/he can be given some. If parents desire their children to be independent and strong, they will need to be comfortable with giving kids choices and learning from their mistakes.

+ Foster a connection with children based on communication and trust. Control may lead to compliance, but it does not lead to heart change. Instead of striving to control, it is much more valuable and lasting to be able to influence. Influence may seem flimsy in comparison to control, but in fact it is just the opposite. Influence, the ability to persuade kids to believe in something for themselves, is much stronger than control, which dissolves into nothingness when the threats aren’t present. An important axiom of raising kids is that – “As long as you are connected, you have influence.” And when your kid is on their own – at that party or on that trip with friends or with their boyfriend or girlfriend after the prom – influence is all you’ve got.

Rebel or robot isn’t the only option. Kids need expectations and guidelines, but they don’t need us to go into a power mode to force them to behave.

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Fun Fact 1: Completed the first online summer course this past week featuring the ideas of The Better Plan. Topics included managing without coercing, the spiritual implications of internal and external control, the caring and deadly habits, the basic needs, quality world, creativity, and total behavior, to name a few. Reading the Soul Shaper book was a part of the class, along with a number of the posts from this Better Plan blog site.

Fun Fact 2: I’m retired, but will continue, for the time being, to teach at PUC.
August 23, 2019 7 Comments

A Chair, a Glass of Water, and a Microphone – We Still Miss You, Bill

It was six years ago today that William Glasser passed away. (b. May 11, 1925 – d. August 23, 2013) For all who knew him it was a deep loss that we experienced at a heart level. His ideas impacted us in such tangible and meaningful ways and we wondered if we had thanked him enough and acknowledged the influence he had, and continues to have, in our lives. As part of my reflection today, which for me has included a few tears and many more smiles, I looked back on some of our almost 50 interviews together. I share this excerpt with you, not because of it’s earthshaking significance, but instead because of it’s joy-sparking simplicity.

Bill Glasser, a chair, a glass of water, and a microphone

An excerpt of interview #4 on November 28, 2003

Roy: Ok, you were back in . .  .

Glasser:  I was in Akron.

Roy:  Akron, yeh.  How did that go?

Glasser:  It went very well. That was the University of Akron, it was a really good talk.  I’m really honing my talk on mental health.  And, actually I’m now planning, we’re trying to set it up for the 18thof January, which is a Sunday, I’m trying to, uh, we’re gonna record some very fancy DVD recordings and bring all my work up to date with the new book Warning and everything.  And so, you’ll get those tapes, you’ll have that [stuff, too].

Roy:  Ok.  Seeing you there with the microphone (for this session I had him holding a hand-held microphone) is such a, uh .  . .

Glasser:  A common way to see me?

Roy:  A common, yeh, a very common way to see you, and actually, I’d like to maybe ask you, I was actually thinking about this on the way down today, uh, I’ve seen you speak a number of times.  In fact, it would be hard for me to count how many times. I’ve actually arranged a few of those and prior to one of your talks that I arranged, uh, I don’t know if it was you or Linda Harshman, uh, just pointed out to me that all you needed was basically a comfortable chair, a small table with a glass of water on it, and a microphone and you were ready to go.

Glasser: Right.  Still am.

Roy:  Still am.

Glasser:  I never use overhead projectors or things like that because that to me doesn’t work.  The audience doesn’t, it just doesn’t work.  They’re reading an overhead or .  . .  To me it’s foolish, Powerpoint and all that stuff.  For me it doesn’t work.

Roy:   Now you, you have, uh, I’ve seen you give talks that pretty much last the whole day, other than the break for lunch  .  .  .

Glasser:  Yeh, I have lots of material.

Roy:  I’ve seen you given talks that last, oh, approximately an hour and a half.  I’ve seen you give talks to maybe, you know, small groups of thirty people, and I’ve seen you give talks to a group exceeding five thousand people and every, every time it’s the same for you as far as your, uh, microphone, a glass of water, no notes.

Glasser:  I never use notes.

Roy:  I just have to, when you, when you, ok, like the one I saw where you spoke to over 5,000 people, I mean a gigantic auditorium .  .  .

Glasser:  People even I didn’t see, they were recording .  .  .

Roy:   No, you were on closed-circuit television.  Uh, I mean, prior to the talk, do you, do you have things clear in your mind or do you kind of feel like I know this stuff well enough that I’ll go up and start talking and see how it goes?

Glasser:  I know the stuff well enough, but I usually figure out how to start. I have the first couple of sentences in my mind to get it started.  And then after that, sometimes I’m surprised what happens after that, because I believe that if I have the talk too rehearsed then I lose all the creativity that’s available to me in this subject, so I figured this out a long time ago, so I just start talking and I, it works.  And, I’m not nervous before a talk.

Roy:  Yeh, I was wondering about that, too.

Glasser:  It’s just the opposite.  I’m anxious to go.  I can’t wait til the introduction is over, you know.  (laughter)  And you know, I like the Johnny Carson introduction where somebody says, “Here’s Bill,” and that’s good enough for me, and uh, because I’m so, I’m not being .  .  .  I’m not bragging or anything, I’m just so bursting with information I want to share that I, that I, you know, when people like something I’m gonna do, they want me to do it in an hour and I suggest that it won’t cost you any more money if you give me maybe an hour and a half to start, and then, so something I was asked to do recently, we tried to schedule something .  .  .

Roy:  How .  .  .

Glasser:  People that hire speakers they, they think that no one is going to sit for an hour, you know (laughter), but my audiences sit there for longer.

Roy:  That’s true.  How much after a talk, how much do you self-evaluate or how much do you critique yourself after a talk?

Glasser:  No, I don’t really do that.  I just say it was a good talk.  Sometimes I remember that I forgot to say something I wanted to say, but the audience will never know and I don’t worry about it.  If anything, I give the audience more information than they really can deal with easily, so I don’t worry about leaving something out.  But talking is what I do.  Writing is not .  .  .   I love to write now .  .  .  writing, though, has been learned.  But talking, I started talking in 1958, when I started lecturing for the California Youth Authority, I started working there in 57, and, 56 actually. I started working at the Ventura School, and then the lectures were so interesting that Miss Perry said, you know, to other superintendents when they met me, you ought to have Dr. Glasser, so I talked all around the Youth Authority, and then, I started talking to educators also, after I published the book, Mental Health or Mental Illness.

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Indeed he did start talking to educators, and what an impact he had and continues to have in that field especially. So many of the current trends – social/emotional learning, mastery learning, focusing on relevance, restorative justice, and the importance of positive relationships – can be traced back to him.

Reading this short excerpt reminds me of his energy and the commitment he had to his beliefs. He was a relentless force, a gentle force, but a force in every sense of the word. Discouragement did not derail him and doubt did not slow him. Ultimately, the excerpt reminds me to buck up and be like Bill! On this important day, may you be invited and inspired and persuaded to buck up, too. The ideas of Choice Theory and Reality Therapy are as effective as ever.

Glasser during a talk in Ventura, CA.
May 21, 2019 4 Comments

We Live the Feeling of Our Thinking

 

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This picture just captivates me.

On one level I am drawn to its wonderful creativity. I bought the door stop pictured below for my office door out of sheer respect for whoever the person was who thought of it. This kind of creativity needs to be rewarded.

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I have to tip my cap to this artist of the chain link fence picture as well. On another level, though, this picture goes so much deeper than just creativity. What is it saying to you? The chain link fence, ubiquitous, a comparatively cheap and efficient way to keep something in or keep something out, strong, you can see what is on the other side, yet you cannot reach it. The design of the fence itself is a model of conformity and permanence. Its tightly wound wire states very emphatically that “you can’t get out.”

Yet in this picture, not only can someone get past this fence now, the fence itself is breaking free. The very instrument of control, force, and restriction is itself becoming instruments of freedom. Dead weight has become helium. Anchors have become wings.

It is easy to see ourselves in the picture, both in the lock-step control of the lower part of the fence and in the links breaking free in the upper part of the fence. Optimism spills out from the picture, even if only to feel good for the links flying into the distance. “Good for you,” we whisper. “Good for you.” So powerful are the images of the links as wings that even the total grayness of the picture cannot keep us feeling gray.

Of course, we need not only whisper, good for you. The links taking off to who knows where can be us. Those freedom loving links can represent our new way of being, our new view of the world, our recognition that we can choose to leave a tightly wound focus on control.

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It would be interesting to use this picture as part of an assignment in school. I can see it easily being used in creative writing for Language Arts, or for activities in Health class, or Social Studies, or Bible. What are some thought questions that could open the discussion in a class setting? Such questions might include –

What is this picture saying?
What did the artist want to convey?
The caption under this picture said that We Live the Feeling of Our Thinking. What does that mean?
Did someone need to cut the links to free them or did they free themselves?
Does this picture suggest that fences are bad and that being free of them is the goal?
Is there such a thing as a good fence?
What would make a fence less good, or even bad?

What do you think? How could this picture be used in a classroom or in a choice theory workshop? How could the picture’s creativity and insight really be plugged into? What questions would you add to those listed above?

* This post is reprinted from January 31, 2015
November 4, 2018 2 Comments

Throwing Any Fish?

Behaviorism didn’t become an ism for nothing.

We are influenced by circumstantial stimuli, to events in the world around us, and there is no getting around it. Behaviorism responds to this point by saying, “Well said.” Choice Theory responds by saying, “Not so fast.”

Behaviorism, wanting more than just influence, though, goes on to claim the ability to predict behavior. In other words, certain stimuli will lead to certain behavior. Do A and you will get B. Animal trainers at Marine World, for instance, explain how the strategic use of food, like tossing a fish to a dolphin, will condition the dolphin to perform specific behaviors and tricks.

The strategies of Behaviorism have been less reliable when used on humans. Some level of success seems apparent, yet at the same time something seems not quite right.

Speaking of fish, Anne Lamott, in Bird by Bird (1994), shared an interaction she had with her son when he was small.

I was teaching Sam peace chants for a long time, when he was only two. It was during the war in the Persian Gulf; I was a little angry.
“What do we want?” I’d call to Sam.
“Peace,” he’d shout dutifully.
“And when do we want it?” I’d ask.
“Now!” he’d say, and I’d smile and toss him a fish.

This story, an admission really, invites us to answer the question, How then do we teach others, especially children, what needs to be learned? How can we make sure this important learning happens? How can we, in the words of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, make it so? Anne Lamott went on to suggest that fish tossing may have more to do with the fish tosser than the fish catcher, or even the desired behavior –

The words were utterly meaningless to him, of course. I might as well have taught him to reply “Spoos!” instead of “Peace” and “August” instead of “Now.” My friends loved it, though; all three of his grandparents loved it. Now, how much does this say about me and my longings? I think something like this would tell a reader more about a character than would three pages of description. It would tell is about her current politics and the political tradition from which she sprang, her people-pleasing, her longing for peace and her longing to belong, her way of diluting rage and frustration with humor, while also using her child as a prop, a little live Charlie McCarthy. The latter is horrifying, but it’s also sort of poignant. Maybe thirty five years ago this woman had to perform for her parents’ friends. Maybe she was their little Charlie McCarthy. Maybe she and her therapist can discuss it for the next few months. And did this woman stop using her kid, once she realized what she was doing? No, she didn’t, and this tells us even more. She kept at it, long after the war was over, until one day she called to her three-and-a-half-year-old son, “Hey—what do we want?” And he said plaintively, “Lunch.”

A live, little Charlie McCarthy. You would have to be rather old (or be a whiz at Trivial Pursuit) to understand the significance of her referring to Charlie McCarthy in this way. Through much of the 1940s and 50s, Charlie was a radio and television personality. Debonair and quick-witted, he had a real following. He was known to sit a lot, though, given that he was the ventriloquist doll of the comedian, Edgar Bergen (the father of actress Candice Bergen). Charlie may have appeared like he had a mind (and mouth) of his own, however he truly was the parrot of his talented handler. Such an arrangement with a doll made from a block of wood is fine, certainly entertaining, but Anne Lamott recoiled in horror at the thought of her little boy becoming her own little Charlie McCarthy, mouthing her words and acting her behaviors on command.

Charlie McCarthy (on the left) and Edgar Bergen.

Where is the line between teaching and indoctrinating, between learning and brainwashing, between the pursuit of ideas and the pressuring of ideas? Are some ideas so important that they require indoctrination?

Such questions bring another McCarthy to mind, that being Joseph McCarthy of the 1950s Communist witch hunt. As a U.S. senator from Wisconsin, McCarthy claimed to have a list of Communist sympathizers and spies who had infiltrated the highest levels of government, the armed forces, and even the entertainment industry. He made unsubstantiated claims and attempted to smear the reputation of people he thought soft on communism and socialism. His tactics added to the already growing fears about Russia and communism and indeed swept the country. Fear, threats and force were his preferred tools and many people were unfairly affected by his attacks.

Joseph McCarthy

Two McCarthy’s – one a puppet that mirrored his owner and the other a politician who bludgeoned others with his ideology. The little-block-of-wood Charlie McCarthy reminds us of our temptation to craft our children into little blocks of our own making, while the-Senator McCarthy reminds us of the temptation to force others, maybe especially our children, to think and act in the way we deem best. The latter seems just as horrifying as the former.

Behaviorism and stimulus-response cannot with any level of certainty predict human behavior because humans are so .  . well .  .  unpredictable. Oh, we might be predictable now and again, but that isn’t really being predictable, is it? Some caved to Senator McCarthy’s attacks, while others stood up to him; and Anne Lamott’s son eventually said he was ready for lunch, rather than continuing to parrot about peace.

Choice Theory explains that we behave to satisfy a need, which may or may not jibe with the behaviors the fish-tossers in our life want. Better to focus on the needs of our children and then to teach them how to appropriately meet their needs. Besides helping children become self-managers, rather than parrots, getting rid of fish can improve the overall smell of things in general.
August 31, 2018 7 Comments

Snookered by the Russians?

Of all the questions being asked regarding Russian involvement in the 2016 presidential election, the most important question is being overlooked. Instead of directing questions to Trump or the Russians, voters in America need to be looking in the mirror and asking  – Was I personally snookered by the Russians or by someone who wanted me to vote a certain way? And if so – What is it about me that is susceptible to being snookered?

Consider: the Russians, to my knowledge, are not being accused of stuffing ballot boxes or electronically screwing with our voting devices (not that they didn’t want to). Instead, if I understand correctly, they are being accused of flooding social media like Face Book with untruths and misstatements that would raise concerns and lead to a Trump victory. They didn’t mess with hardware or actual votes; they messed with our minds. Shouldn’t we be asking how it is that our minds are so easily messed with?

Easily messed with minds were around before the 2016 election. Jesus himself talked about screwed up thinking when He explained how it is possible to believe your thinking is filled with light, when in fact the light you think you have is actually darkness (Matt. 6:23). Dark thinking such as this, Jesus further points out, can even lead people to kill others and then claim they are doing it in the name of God (John 16:2). The apostle Paul wrote about people being capable of having an enthusiasm for God, but this enthusiasm being based on “misdirected zeal” (Rom. 10:2).

Easily messed with, screwed up, misdirected. Whatever you want to call it, the question remains – How do we achieve such confusion? And is it possible to break free of the psychological/spiritual fog and climb into clearer air?

Your Lying Mind, a recent article in The Atlantic (Sept. 2018), considers the phenomena of bias and the ways in which it influences, and even seems to commandeer, our choices. Ben Yagoda, the article’s author, refers to several biases, some of them significant, some less so. Examples include – Hyperbolic Discounting Bias: choosing to take $150 today rather than wait for $180 in a month (although when offered $150 in a year or $180 in 13 months, people consistently choose the $180); Actor-Observer Bias – the tendency for explanations of other individual’s behaviors to overemphasize the influence of their personality and underemphasize the influence of their situation, while explaining our own behavior in just the opposite); or the Zeignarik Effect – uncompleted tasks are remembered better than completed ones. And let’s not forget the IKEA Effect – where people place a disproportionate value on objects they assemble themselves.

Soon, though, Yagoda gets to a key point of the article when he writes, “If I had to single out a particular bias as the most pervasive and damaging, it would probably be confirmation bias. That’s the effect that leads us to look for evidence confirming what we already think or suspect, to view facts and ideas we encounter as further confirmation, and to discount or ignore any piece of evidence that seems to support an alternate view.” As I share this passage with you, my country – the United States – is anything but united and instead is wracked by political and social division; and my church – Seventh-day Adventist – isn’t doing a whole lot better. In both cases, I see confirmation bias as playing a key role in the problem.

Choice Theory offers that if we have a high need for power we may find fulfillment in dominating others; or that if we have a high need for purpose we may find it need-satisfying to embrace a rigid set of beliefs, even if these beliefs are racist and hateful. Of course, people can also have their need for power met through relating to and effectively cooperating with others, and the need for purpose can be met by clarifying one’s own beliefs without forcing them onto others. There is nothing that says we have to be one way or another. We do, though, place ourselves in a position of growth, that is being open to learning and change, or in a position of inertia, that is being firm in your course and unopen to change.

This post has me really thinking about the purpose of bias, and whether or not it has an important function. I can think of a lot of damaging biases, but I am hard-pressed to think of helpful biases. Can you think of a helpful bias?

I think fear is a big part of bias. A 2013 post – Why Are So Many Christians So Un-Christian? – referred to the phenomena of rationalization or what is known as motivated reasoning, where we choose what to believe and then go about finding information to support it. “We push threatening information away,” the author explains, “and we pull friendly information close. Our faculties are usually put to the task of trying to defend what we already believe, not towards developing a better understanding of the world.” A TED talk to which I referred in this same 2013 post described the difference between a warrior mindset and a scout mindset. The warrior is driven toward one goal, to survive through defending or attacking, while the scout is driven to understand and to gain a complete and accurate picture of the facts. Defending and attacking, again, are fear words.

I don’t like it when people, whether or not they are from another country, try to mess with us through social media, and I think steps should be taken to keep that from happening, but I’d like it even better if we as individuals became less .  . .  well .  .  .  easily messed with.  Fear, worry, and anxiety contribute to this kind of vulnerability.  The poet Hafiz (14thcentury) once said that “Fear is the cheapest room in the house; I’d like to see you in better living conditions.” His view echoed that of the Apostle Paul, who centuries earlier had penned, “For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of love, power, and a sound mind.” (2 Tim. 1:7) Our power of choice gives us the ability to discern, to weigh the evidence, and to not simply look for information that supports our beliefs.

Fear is the cheapest room in the house;
I’d like to see you in better living conditions.

The Atlantic article asks whether or not it is possible for an individual to change or eliminate a bias. Experts were quoted that came down on both sides of the argument. From my perspective, Choice Theory lands firmly on the side that biases can indeed be changed. Hope for our planet now hinges on this belief.

 
June 4, 2018 1 Comment

Impossible to Love and Control at Same Time

Terry Crews, actor, author, and former NFL player, recently appeared on The Daily Show and spoke about #MeToo, toxic masculinity and domestic abuse. In the short video clip included here, he describes how he used to believe in the male stereotype of being in control, but that he came to realize that the important people in his life were distancing themselves from him. Now he realizes that love is the answer and that –

“it is impossible to love someone and control them at the same time.”

Click on the video link below and be touched and inspired and reminded – reminded that hope is still all around us.

 

It seems that wherever and whenever good things are happening the principles of Choice Theory are close at hand. Terry said so much when he stated –

“You telling other people what to do does not make you the boss;
you doing what you told yourself to do makes you the boss.”

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Schedule update – I have decided to cancel The Better Plan classes for this summer (2018) at Pacific Union College. Stay tuned next summer.
April 26, 2018 2 Comments

7 Cardinal Rules for Life

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I’ve appreciated the stuff that often is posted by the website at www.lifehack.org, like the 7 Cardinal Rules for Life that follow here. (What cardinals have to do with rules for life, I’m not sure.) Along with the Rules, I share a choice theory response to each of them. (Of note: The Better Plan workshop dates for this summer have been set and are listed at the end of the blog.)

7 Cardinal Rules for Life

Rule #1 – Make peace with your past, so it doesn’t spoil your present. Your past does not define your future – your actions and beliefs do.

It would be hard to come up with a more choice theory statement than this one. I think the phrase “make peace with your past” is important. We’re not trying to run from the past, hide from it, cover it, or deny it. We come to desire our joy in the present and realize our need to see the past for whatever it is and, like it says, make peace with it. I like the statement’s emphasis on thinking and acting, too, which supports the idea of every behavior being a total behavior. It really is pretty amazing that we were created to have direct control over what we think and what we do.

Rule #2 – What others think of you is none of your business. It’s how much you value yourself and how important you think you are.

Choice theory emphasizes that the only person we can control is ourselves, but I like how Rule #2 is worded. It is such a debilitating condition to be worried about what others think of you. It is so freeing to let this particular worry go.

Rule #3 – Time heals almost everything, give time, time. Pain will be less hurting. Scars make us who we are; they explain our life and why we are the way we are. They challenge us and force us to be stronger.

I hesitate to write about #3. The topic of wounds, especially emotional and spiritual wounds, is a sacred space to me and deserves a special respect. That said, it is apparent to me that some people allow healing to take place and continue to want to make the best of life, while others seem to want to nurture the hurt and hold onto it.

Rule #4 – No one is the reason for your own happiness, except you yourself. Waste no time and effort searching for peace and contentment and joy in the world outside.

The world of choice theory is a place of responsibility. A key, though, is that responsibility is something that dawns on a person, rather than it being a message that one person enforces on another. Responsibility functions best when it is like the sun coming up in a person’s life, providing light to see the world in a new way.

Rule #5 – Don’t compare your life with others. You have no idea what their journey is all about. If we all threw our problems in a pile and saw everyone else’s, we would grab ours back as fast as we could.

Comparing our life to that of others traps us in thinking that our happiness depends on our circumstances being different. Or worse, that our happiness depends on our circumstances being better than someone else’s. Choice theory keeps bringing us back to our happiness coming from within, not from without.

Rule #6 – Stop thinking too much. It’s alright not to know the answers. Sometimes there is no answer, not going to be any answer, never has been an answer. That’s the answer! Just accept it, move on, NEXT!

I’ll have to think about this one.

Rule #7 – Smile, you don’t own all the problems in the world. A smile can brighten the darkest day and make life more beautiful. It is a potential curve to turn a life around and set everything straight.

A smile is a choice. Yes, sometimes we laugh as a reflex, but sometimes we just need to choose to smile. And in making that choice, in a small way, the day does get just a little bit better.

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Which of the Life Hack Rules do you relate to? Did any of them get you thinking about choice theory ideas? Let me know.

Reminder – Middle School and High School teachers can share the Rules with students and have them respond to them and evaluate them. They can be a great springboard for talking about choice and responsibility. Tie a writing assignment to them. Discuss them in a life skills class.

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Important Dates

The Better Plan workshop dates for this coming summer at PUC have been set.

The Better Plan 1 –  June 25 – 28

The Better Plan 2 –  July 9 – 12

If you have questions about the workshops get in touch with me at jroy@puc.edu.

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* 7 Cardinal Rules for Life first appeared as a Better Plan post on January 25, 2014. It has proven to be a popular post and I wanted to share it with those of who may not have seen it yet. Remember that the Year At a Glance pages have a lot of choice theory articles that you can easily access at the touch of a link.
April 21, 2018 1 Comment

Led Zeppelin and Internal Control Psychology

Glasser referred to Choice Theory as an internal control psychology. Gaining an understanding of Choice Theory means coming into an understanding of internal control and that our thoughts and behaviors are from within us, rather than externally imposed on us. What follows are a couple of short stories that highlight this internal control thinking process –

                                                      STORY ONE
A few weeks ago I was sitting in a high school Art classroom, observing one of my student teachers as she did her practice teaching. Her lesson went very well and led to students having time to work on their individual art projects. The mentor teacher asked if he should put some music on as the kids worked and my student teacher said, “Sure.” Soon the tunes of Led Zeppelin were filling the classroom, a pleasant surprise for me, given my own 70s exposure to rock and roll.

I took a short video clip of the classroom, with music pulsating in the background, and sent it to my son, now grown and a lawyer, thinking he would get a kick out of it since he came to appreciate Led Zeppelin, too, during his 90s exposure to the music world.

My text message to him (which accompanied the video clip) said, “I am in the Calistoga High Art classroom, observing one of our candidates doing her student teaching. The Art teacher put on some tunes after the lesson was done, and the kids were working independently. Thought of you.”

Several hours later he replied, “I must have gone to the wrong school! Though I’m not sure I would’ve liked it as much if my teacher had played it.”

What a great example of the internal choice process happening within each of us all the time. My son’s comment reveals that there are many reasons a young person might be drawn to certain kinds of music. The tone and beat of the music itself can appeal, as can the lyrics, as can how edgy the performer or group is. Kids like music for social reasons, including the idea that it gives them a way to assert their independence, much to the chagrin of adults wanting to control that independence.

“I’m not sure I would’ve liked it as much if my teacher had played it.”

All of these reasons are internally based and uniquely unpredictable. Teenagers choose music for reasons that are important to them, including whether or not adults like their particular music, too

                                                   STORY TWO
My wife and I were driving to the Sacramento airport a couple of weeks ago. We went through Napa, which eventually brought us to Hwy 80 toward Sacramento. People drive fast on Hwy 80 (like 80 is more the speed limit than the highway number). We were in the fast lane, but it was raining off and on, and when it rained it was raining quite hard. As a result, I wanted to keep a safe distance between me and the cars ahead.

My wife frequently reminds me about tailgating and will sometimes ask me to slow down if she thinks I am driving too close, although in this case I was already driving slower and keeping a safe distance. At one of these rainy, slow-down moments she said, “Thank you for not tail-gating.” Almost immediately, instead of thinking thoughts like thank you for noticing, I found myself thinking thoughts like I am driving this way because it is safe for these circumstances, not because you want me to drive slower. I am a bit embarrassed to admit this about myself, but it is one more example of the internal thinking process.*

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Consider for a moment the phrase internal locus of control. If we look it up we find that “In personality psychology, locus of control is the degree to which people believe that they have control over the outcome of events in their lives, as opposed to external forces beyond their control.” This definition is helpful because it explains what internal control isn’t, rather than what it is. Choice theory, and the internal control that it describes, isn’t about having control over the outcome of events. Choice theory describes how people can intentionally control their own thinking and behavior and in the process very much affect their emotions. Choice theory describes how our motivation comes from within for reasons that are uniquely personal.

We cannot control events, but we can intentionally affect our
cognitive and emotional response.

Choice theory does not guarantee that we can change the outcome of events in our lives. It does guarantee that we are capable of changing our thinking and our emotions in ways that improve our mental and emotional health.

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Exercise: Begin to identify examples of your own personal internal control psychology. Identify moments in your thinking that are entirely generated by you or that are unique interpretations of events that others most likely see differently. Practice acknowledging your viewpoint as just that, simply your viewpoint. Consider what your viewpoints say about you – Are you an acceptor? A blamer? An encourager? A critic? A risk-taker? A worrier? The viewpoints that we nurture are in some way need-satisfying. Not always helpful to ourselves or others, but need-satisfying none-the-less. When it comes to our mental health and our relationship health, our internal control viewpoints are everything.

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EDUTOPIA and Social-Emotional Learning

Reality: Educational journals and a growing number of school districts are emphasizing the need for social-emotional learning in schools (SEL). Increasingly, educators are realizing that academic success is less about amount of content covered and more about becoming a competent learner. For such learning to occur, schools must be emotionally safe and students must learn to self-manage their own thinking and emotions. These are mandates that if ignored, will only postpone the success of our students, and ultimately our country.

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* Do you have personal examples of internal control thinking? I’d love to hear them!! Share them as a response to this post.
March 31, 2018 2 Comments

How Emotions Are Made

I love it when research and science confirm Glasser’s beliefs, and Dr. Lisa Feldman Barrett’s book, How Emotions Are Made (2017) does just that in a big way!

HowEmotionsAreMade

Glasser wanted people to understand the concept (and reality) of internal control, that is, that they are not controlled by circumstances outside of them nor are they victims of life’s curve balls, but rather they are the architects of their thinking and their behavior.

Glasser created the concepts of total behavior to give people insights into their choices. Using the graphic of a car, he emphasized that thinking and acting are represented by the two front tires, the two tires that a driver can directly steer and control. Glasser’s point was that similarly people can have direct control over their own thinking and acting. The remaining two parts of a total behavior are feelings and physiology, or our emotions and all the ways that our bodies come into alignment with the other parts of our behavior. He believed that we can have only indirect control over our feelings and our physiology. For him, the key was that our total behaviors throughout the day always come into alignment with each other.

Total Behavior Car

The tires on a car are used to represent the four parts of total behavior.

How Emotions Are Made does nothing to argue that point and, if anything, Feldman Barrett goes farther than Glasser in explaining that not only are we the architects of our thinking and behavior, we are also the architect of our emotions. Check out the TED talk that follows for her brief presentation –

The TED talk is good, but I want to share some quotes from the book that reveal why a Choice theorist would especially be interested in her findings.

Emotions are not reactions to the world. You are not a passive receiver of sensory input but an active constructor of your emotions. From sensory input and past experience, your brain constructs meaning and prescribes action.*

Glasser made a case for our behavior coming from within, rather than being controlled by others, and Feldman Barrett believes the same as it relates to emotions. In this next quote, she reminded me of Glasser and the way he would state the terms he really didn’t want to use – terms like mental illness, schizophrenia, and bi-polar, to name a few. Read her quote that follows and you’ll see what I mean.

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Lisa Feldman Barrett

Likewise, we do not “recognize” or “detect” emotions in others. These terms imply that an emotion category has a fingerprint that exists in nature, independent of any perceiver, waiting to be found. Any scientific question about “detecting” emotion automatically presumes a certain kind of answer. In the construction mindset, I speak of perceiving an instance of emotion. Perception is a complex mental process that does not imply a neural fingerprint behind the emotion, merely that an instance of emotion occurred somehow. I also avoid verbs like “triggering” emotion, and phrases like “emotional reaction” and emotions “happening to you.” Such wording implies that emotions are objective entities. Even when you feel no sense of agency when experiencing emotion, which is most of the time, you are an active participant in that experience.*

If by introducing you to How Emotions Are Made, and sharing these quotes from the book, I have ignited more questions that answers – good. I encourage you to read the book for yourself. I am convinced Glasser would have added it to his book collection, right there on his office shelf alongside other books like Mad in America (2001), by Robert Whitaker.

We’ll end the post today with this last quote, which summarizes her Glasser-like findings –

After conducting hundreds of experiments in my lab, and reviewing thousands more by other researchers, I’ve come to a profoundly unintuitive conclusion shared by a growing number of scientists. Emotions do not shine forth from the face nor from the maelstrom of your body’s inner core. They don’t issue from a specific part of the brain. No scientific innovation will miraculously reveal a biological fingerprint of any emotion. That’s because our emotions aren’t built in, waiting to be revealed. They are made. By us. We don’t recognize emotions or identify emotions: we construct our own emotional experiences, and our perceptions of others’ emotions, on the spot, as needed, through a complex interplay of systems. Human beings are not at the mercy of mythical emotion circuits buried deep within animalistic parts of our highly evolved brain: we are architects of our own experience.*

Feldman Barrett’s work will help anyone trying to better understand human behavior and motivation, and especially those of us interested in the emotional pieces of what Glasser referred to as total behavior.

* Sorry about not having the page numbers. I purchased the book on my iPad, which doesn’t have the same page numbering as the hard copy.

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Human beings are not at the mercy of mythical emotion circuits
buried deep within animalistic parts of our highly evolved brain:
we are architects of our own experience.
Lisa Feldman Barrett

 

 

 

 
March 1, 2018 No comments

Marriage and Those Pesky Trash Cans

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Sophie Sims-Stapleton turned onto her street and could see them as plain as day. It wasn’t day, of course. It was actually twilight, the evening fast approaching as street lights started to come on, the darkness slowly draping the neighborhood. Her commute had taken a bit longer this evening, which had prompted her to abandon her plans to stop at Safeway on the way home, but even in the twilight she could clearly see them. All three of them, standing in front of her house like sentinels – the brown one, the green one, and the blue one. Except they weren’t sentinels; they were trash cans, standing somewhat askew after the trash truck had emptied them with its robotic arm and unceremoniously dropped them back onto the pavement. And now they were chiding her with a message as clear as their bold colors, that message being, You don’t matter!

As she neared the house she could see her husband’s car already parked in the driveway, which seemed to grind salt in her festering wound. Hadn’t she and Greg, her husband, talked about this at length last week, after the cans had sat in front of the house for three days following trash day, both of them expecting the other to bring the cans to the side yard where they were stored during the week. The two of them had quietly and sullenly dug in, both acting like they hadn’t noticed the cans in front of the house, even though it was difficult to park with them sitting where the trash truck had ditched them.

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“Why can’t you just bring them in?” she pleaded. “You usually get home first.”

“I usually do,” he retorted, “but why can’t you bring them in once in a while? I help around the house, seems like you could help with some of the outdoor stuff now and again.”

Truth be told, she felt that her job was more stressful, and basically more important than his, and that he should pick up more of the chores at home. It bothered her that he could act, through his ignoring of the trash cans, like he was somehow equal to her. He had reminded her of the things weighing on him at work, as well as at church, with all the time he was donating to the needs of the building committee, and she had momentarily relented, even as she harbored a sense of resentment toward his laziness and stubbornness. In the end, they had gone out and brought in the trash cans together, which kind of felt good, like they had solved a problem through communicating and respect.

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Yet now, just a few days later, the trash cans once again were askew in front of the house, with big grins on the front of them (at least as far as she was concerned), driving home the point that her needs didn’t matter. As she navigated around the blue recycle can to park in her usual place, her thoughts were not positive.

I kind of hate him, she thought to herself. Why can’t he just bring in the freaking trash cans? Seeing his car parked in its usual place she got even angrier. He’s been home for how long? A half hour? An hour? That’s plenty of time to bring in a few trash cans. Jeez! Why do I have to nag him? His laziness makes me crazy!

The thought occurred to her to bring in the trash cans herself, but she responded gruffly to such an idea. That would be totally non-supportive of her goal. There are responsibilities for which he needs to step up to the plate, and this is one of them. She laughed at herself for even entertaining the thought of bringing the cans in herself. True, during last week’s discussion on this very point she had agreed that sometimes she could bring in the cans, too, but she pushed this memory aside now. Instead, the thought occurred to her to place one of the cans directly behind his car so that he would have to move it in the morning.

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The front porch was dark, which added to her anger fuel. If he gets home first, can’t he at least turn on the porch lights as a courtesy to others that come home later? How did I marry this jerk? What was I thinking?

She put the finishing touches on her anger and frustration, all of it completely merited and defensible, as she covered the final steps to the front door. Which persona to be she wondered as she unlocked the door – should I go with lashing-out anger or should I go with the silent treatment? Full of appropriate disgust she entered a dark house. What’s going on? she thought.

“Greg,” she called out. “Greg,” she tried again. But only silence in return. What in the world?

And then a memory slipped across her mind. Her brow furrowed as the audio memory tape in her brain wound into position. She almost declined to press the play button, but her brain seemed to have an automatic play option. Faintly, but growing stronger, the tape said, Honey, I will be home late tonight. Roger is picking me up in the morning, as we have a joint meeting in Forrest City tomorrow for work, and then we are both part of the special board meeting this evening at the church. It may be close to 10:00 when I get home. She recalled the look on his face as he explained his schedule, the way he regretted being away from her for the evening, and a pang of awareness began to overtake her.

She turned the kitchen light on and immediately saw the note he had written, after she had left for work.

Just a reminder that I will be home late tonight.
More meetings at the church.
I’ll get the trash cans in when I get home, though.
Love, Greg.

She stared at that simple note for a long time, her eyes growing wet as the recognition regarding her own anger became clearer and clearer. A tear dropped on to the note, quickly blurring the ink of trash and cans. She had created a story and nurtured it into a reality that she had fully embraced. Her reality had led her to think terrible things about her husband, but she was beginning to see that she had made it all up. All of it. For some reason, she realized, her version of reality applied the worst interpretation to Greg’s behavior, while applying the best interpretation to her own behavior. Another tear dropped onto the note, this time obliterating the word Love.

That can’t happen she thought to herself. Our love can’t be so easily blurred. And with that she returned to the entryway, turned on the porch light, and headed into the night air to get the trash cans and put them away.

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It is true that reality influences our perceptions. Our circumstances can affect any part of our total behavior – our thinking, our acting, our feelings, or our physiology. Information and events external to us may or may not matter. A ringing telephone, as Glasser used to say, lets us know that someone wants to talk with us, but it can’t force us to answer it. An angry, threatening person may convince us to comply with his demand, or it may not. We decide. In fact, we make a ton of these decisions every day. Circumstances constantly hit us with data; we process the data and decide how to respond.

It is just as true that our perceptions create our reality. In fact, this may be one of the most important of the elements of choice theory. It is probably more accurate to say that our embraced perceptions create our reality. When we settle on a value or belief, everything we experience passes through our values filter. The result of this filtering is our version of reality. Our actions are always based on our view of reality, so the importance of this process cannot be overstated.

It can be hard for some to come to grips with the idea that people create their own version of reality. Reality is reality, some say; it isn’t a matter of opinion. For each of us, though, reality is formed in the frontal cortex of our brains, which continuously takes in millions of bits of information and turns it into pictures and sounds and smells. A danger lurks in the belief that our personal pictures and sounds and smells represent total, all-knowing, crystal-clear reality. Such a view cannot tolerate new information and limits itself to shrunken interpretations. Sophie had embraced faulty pictures of Greg, but she was able to admit this when new information corrected her version of reality. This is not always easy to do – Has anyone’s mind been changed, for instance, because of all the political information and articles being shared on Facebook? Exactly, we choose to ignore some articles, even as we consciously click on links to other articles we consider more trustworthy or accurate. Having values is fine, even preferable, but staying open to new information is a healthier state of mind.

Just remember not to jump to conclusions when you round the corner and see those pesky trash cans still sitting out by the road.

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** This post first appeared on The Better Plan page on October 29, 2016. Trash cans still need to be brought in, though.