Have you ever had the thought if only this other person would stop doing or saying ***, then I wouldn’t get upset (and take it out on them)?
I know I have.
It’s kinda like blaming another person for my behavior, right?
Let’s take a closer look and see how we can navigate this whole thing better by using the concept of an elevator.
We have to start with how and why feelings and emotions get put into “storage”, instead of being processed when they first arise.
One common way this happens is called avoidance. I think we’re all familiar with that one!
Avoidance actually occurs one of two ways.
In the first method, we decide not to deal with something right now because
• we’re busy with a project, work, kids, etc.
• we don’t want to deal with it because it’s uncomfortable
• the timing isn’t right (I’m in a meeting at work when a wave of grief shows up…)
We can put it into “temporary storage”, like in the grief example above. I can decide that a good way to take care of myself is to wait until I get home and have some down time and go into my bedroom where I have privacy and then allow my feelings of grief to surface so I can let them move through me and return to balance.
But often, we put them into “long-term storage” because we don’t want to deal with uncomfortable feelings. This is a very common defense mechanism. We defend against feeling something that we believe will be unpleasant or downright awful.
This is sometimes referred to pushing down our feelings. As a result, I’ve come to think of it as a basement where I ‘push down’ what I want to avoid.
With the second method, it’s a bit more automatic and less intentional. Basically, it’s our unconscious mind that choses avoidance as a defense mechanism. Usually, this starts when we are very young and truly can’t handle big, emotional scary things like witnessing violence (that includes verbal violence), being abused (physically, sexually or mentally), extreme loss and other traumas.
Our brain takes good care of us by ‘pushing away’ what we cannot tolerate. But then we grow up. We become emotionally stronger (unless you spent all of your adolescence using drugs and avoiding growing up…but that’s another story for a different day). But because we learned this way of dealing with difficult feelings, we just keep on using it. So, we avoid feeling tough stuff and just keep pushing it into the basement. It becomes automatic.
So, we end up with a ‘basement’ full of feelings that we don’t want to or could not deal with.
Here’s where the elevator comes in.
In the present moment, other people are going to do and say things that annoy us, really piss us off and hurt us. That’s just natural. Because we don’t have control of what others do and say. But here’s the thing, what might just be a minor transgression, becomes a full-blown shit storm sometimes because when it happens to be a button that got pushed that calls up the elevator from the basement, that elevator car is going to be filled with old, painful or difficult feelings that are overwhelming.
Here’s an example that might better illustrate:
In my ‘basement’ are feelings related to a strong desire to help my mother be happier and less upset. This comes from being a little girl who had a mother who was depressed, anxious, and often angry at her husband because neither of them was very good at communicating with each other. And every little girl feels better when her mother is happy, because that’s when mom is available to play or pay attention. So, I focused on trying to be really good at fixing her problems (when I wasn’t busy creating them). As I got older, the harder I tried to fix, the more she rejected my attempts. As a matter of fact, the more I suggested healthy coping mechanisms, instead of giving her pity or attention or validation, the more upset she got with me.
As a result, I felt helpless, unappreciated and frustrated. Now, imagine that I made many deposits over the years into that storage area in my basement.
Fast forward to today when my husband or son or step-daughter doesn’t want me to ‘fix’ them, despite by best intentions. Let’s just say that my husband gets frustrated with my repeated attempts to encourage him to exercise and shuts me down or tells me to leave him alone.
That is him pushing the button on my elevator. It goes immediately down to the basement, fills up with my stored anger and disappointment, and opens up on the first floor and DUMPS the entire load on him!
Not cool. Because it is MY responsibility to manage what’s in my basement. Even if he’s being a jerk about it (which, of course, he would never do 🙂 ), it’s still always my responsibility to manage my emotions.
My goal here today is to get you to see why it sometimes feels like the other person should just change their behavior. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could always make that happen? But you know the rule: I am always responsible for my feelings and my behavior.
Next week, I’ve got two tools for you to help you deal with this.
