Being and Doing are Different

I am one of those people others think are naïve. I believe that people are essentially good. There’s just one thing that makes me feel that not naïve – I still account for bad behavior.

Simply put, a person and their behavior are different entities. Yes, it is a person who behaves a certain way. But defining an individual by what they do negates the fact that a person is more than what they do.

In psychology, we talk about the Gestalt approach – the whole is greater than the sum of parts. We are also introduced to the cognitive diamond; our functioning depends on the symbiotic relationship between our thoughts, emotions, physiological responses and actions. Taking all of this in consideration, it may make some sense as to why I don’t believe that only one’s actions define them.

There is a difference between lying and being a liar. There is a difference between stealing and being a thief. There is a difference between lashing out and being dangerous. There is a difference between making mistakes and being stupid or incorrigible.

A 45-years-old woman has been drinking since she was 16 years old. She has tried often to reach the goal of sobriety, but falls off the wagon almost every time. It is not difficult to imagine the amount of times she is perceived – or has even been told – that she is hopeless, or weak, or lacks willpower.

We have no idea why she keeps relapsing. The thoughts that run through her mind when she’s not drinking. The physiological side-effects when she doesn’t drink. The emotional numbing that she, perhaps, finds relief in when she’s drinking.

In the process, we provide neither opportunities to learn constructive emotional or cognitive coping skills, nor do we help alleviate the physiological side-effects of withdrawal. She relapses again, we confirm our beliefs that she is hopeless, or weak, or lacks willpower, and there is no change for her situation.

However, calling her an alcoholic brings to mind that drinking is part of her identity, part of who she is. In her own mind, she too may begin defining herself in the same way; “I’m an alcoholic”, not “I drink too much” or “I have a problem with drinking”. Take a moment to consider which of these statements would give the listener more hope for change?

As an alcoholic, it is no longer just an action but embedded in the person as much as their identified ethnicity, personality, sexual orientation. It is unchosen, unbidden…unchangeable.

Now consider her as an individual with a problem with drinking, or an individual with substance use disorder. Drinking or having a substance use disorder are actions. Yes, unchosen. And still unbidden. But not unchangeable. Indeed, old patterns of behavior can be unlearned, and replaced with new, more constructive ones.

Looking past “they do…” to “they are…” not only allows us not to judge a person, it also gives us the opportunity to develop more constructive and healthy relationships with them. If we can isolate a person’s behavior from their identity, we learn to be more non-judgmental. We are able to see the woman as one who continues to have the will to change, and has not stopped trying to do so. A woman with hope. A woman who is strong enough to pick herself up to try again. Indeed, a woman that we may be more willing to help.

Helping an individual separate their behavior from their identity is no easy task. Often, individuals have heard their behavior defining who they are so often that it has become ingrained. They may have heard it since a young age, so that it was organically embedded into their identity. Alternatively, even if an individual did not believe that the behavior defined them, hearing it often enough could lead them to doubt themselves and then accept what others were saying as truth.

At times, it may appear impossible to bring an individual to this realization. We may feel like the individual is resistant. However, we will again be making the error from earlier – judging the person by their actions. It is possible that they are in the pre-contemplation stage of growth; the first stage in the stages of change model.

The Pre-contemplation stage is characterized by a lack of awareness, or a denial, that there is a problem (in this case, the problem being that the behavior is not the same as the whole person). If an individual is in this stage, it simply means that the person is not ready for change. Trying to help the individual separate the behavior from the individual’s identity, then, would be akin to bringing the horse to water but not being able to make it drink. It is important to know when to stop trying and accept that the individual is not ready for such a change.

But it is important to try first. It may indeed be difficult, but once this assumed connection is broken there are simultaneous benefits in rapport-building and in behavior change. Seeing past an individual’s behavior to the identity behind it gives value to the existence of the person. For a person who has lacked validation for some time, this becomes a lifeline, which in turn translates into a sense of trust. Meanwhile, as the behavior is no longer embedded to the point that it is indispensable, it is easier to unlearn and replace with a healthier and more constructive behavior.

A very important sent side note here – We are not obliged to accept everyone regardless of what they do. We, too, have our limits. These limits are just as important as helping those who have not received the help that they deserve.

Behavior must receive consequences. Negative behaviors that do not lead to appropriate consequences are illicitly approved. This is particularly dangerous if we consider extreme negative behaviors. However, such consequences should be limited to the behavior and not the person behind it.

Ignorance vs Adamance

Today’s post builds on my earlier posts about discrimination. If you haven’t read them, this will be new for you. If you have, you may hear echoes from the other posts. Regardless, I hope it offers more insight to another point of view on discrimination.

There have been more than a few times when I spoke to someone on the phone, and – when they met me – they were surprised to find that I was not English, but Indian. At one point, I was asked, “Ok, you’re Indian? Dot or feather?”

When I think about my responses in these situations, I noticed others felt more offended than I did. As I usually land up doing, I found myself wondering why I didn’t feel as offended as others did.

That is when it occurred to me…I have always believed that words are ambiguous. In these situations, I had thought the responses could have been because of ignorance, or a lack of knowledge about what people from another culture would find offensive.

There is a difference between ignorance and adamance. Ignorance, according to the Webster dictionary, refers to “lack of knowledge, education or awareness”. Likewise, adamance is defined as “unshakable or insistent especially in maintaining a position or opinion”. Taken without emotional or social assumptions, in their pure meaning, the former may be unintentional while the latter is decidedly intentional.

In the situations above, I took the opportunity to correct their responses. In the first, I asked if it made a difference; in the latter, I clarified I was East Indian, but not all East Indians had the dot, just as American Indians don’t always wear the feather. In addition, I made it clear that such generalizations were inaccurate, and could be offensive to many.

Fortunately, there had been a change in their subsequent reactions to others and to myself; they used new information to change their responses to individuals from other cultures. This confirmed my belief that their responses were because of a lack of knowledge…ignorance.

There have been situations, however, where I took offense.

As a therapist, I was preparing to take my licensure exam. As I expressed my concerns regarding my performance, my colleagues stated, “Well, you’re Indian, so I’m sure the language barrier must be difficult”. As is my mien, I clarified to her that I had grown up in British-occupied Hong Kong, and English was – in fact – the first language I had ever learnt. The response?

“Yes, but still, you ARE Indian”.

From my perspective, this was a clear instance of adamance – new knowledge was not influencing her response, and it remained as it was despite my clarification. In fact, the earlier situations, if the individuals either defended their responses or no behavior change was seen, that too could be interpreted as adamance.

The threat of prejudice is a perceived one. Since perceptions are not concrete, it behooves us to utilize our executive functioning (our ability to process information we receive) to clarify them. Responding emotionally bypasses our refined skills of processing information. We do not think of what the true meaning was behind what an individual says and we do not use our own knowledge to educate the individual in front of us. We do not consider that they DON’T know better.

What follows is a rapidly deteriorating relationship. We non-verbally – and sometimes verbally – show our emotionally charged disapproval of the individual, and not just their behavior. We avoid the person, put them on the defensive (an automatic response to being attacked emotionally). We fight or avoid them, they fight or avoid us.

I should clarify, our initial indignant – and angry – emotional responses are not wrong. Our emotions are, after all, our evolutionary safeguards to threats. Prejudice and discrimination are real, and an adamant person could well be a threat to us. To deny our original defensive responses to a threat to our cultural identities is impossible. In fact, it would be unhealthy – and dangerous – to do so.

However, we have the advanced skills of executive functioning which we essentially bypass when we only follow our basic emotions. We do not take the time to think – we do not consider that the individual in front of us may not have ever had their original thought process questioned or corrected. We do not consider that, perhaps, they grew up in a culture where those responses were considered ‘normal’.

In the end, then, our response becomes no different than that of the person in front of us; we assume they are a threat, just as they assume they know everything about us based on one aspect of our culture. Meanwhile, there is no new knowledge passed to them, a lost opportunity to advocate for cultural change. We, too, make the assumption that people should, or do, know better.

Not using our executive functioning skills, we may assume that all individuals who give us these amibiguous responses are adamant. If they were ignorant, however, we miss the chance to teach them new information about different cultures. We may lose the chance to interact with someone who could be a culturally competent individual given new knowledge.

Take the time. Educate the person in front of you before reacting. Who knows, we may be able to break the fortress of discrimination from within it instead of from without.

Wanderlust

At 39, I finally got my US driver’s license and a car of my own. I used to drive my parents’ car in India; I have a driver’s license there, too. There are a differences here.

Apart from the obvious, of course – less traffic, better rules, the side we drive on…The other, more personal, difference is my mindset. Driving my parents’ car in India necessitated only driving the car when and where they wished. And that makes sense; the car is a convenience – and now a necessity – for them at this age.

But for me, it felt more and more like a chore to be driving from point to point for specific goals. The constant need for vigilance on roads that were too packed and – more often than not – like a battlefield of competing commuters trying to ‘get there first’, was exhausting. I rarely, if ever, got something out of it other than my parents, or myself, reaching the desired location.

Today, as I write this, I am contemplating how I have driven to another state (about an hour and a half away) 8 times since I got the car a month ago. I find myself wondering how long it will be before I’m on the road again, planning the next trip and allowing for changes in my plan. Almost like I’m reminding myself, reaffirming for myself, the fact that I have freedom here.

As a Third Culture Kid, I often felt rootless – not completely home in India, nor in Hong Kong. This was depressing as a child, as it felt like I never knew where I belonged. But it became liberating as an adult; I was not tied to any one place, which suited me just fine. Just like my tastes in music, film, food – and, indeed, life choices – I am a global citizen. I don’t give any one place more value than another; not by country, state or city.

Throughout my life, I learned several languages because I could. I talked about the differences of British rule in Hong Kong and India because I could. I chose to move to a country other than India or Hong Kong…because I could. I developed an awareness of the difference between discrimination and ignorance because I could. There’s a reason why “I can” indicates an ability AND a choice to do something.

This liberation to choose, however, was until recently stunted by the fact that I could not PHYSICALLY wander the way I wished. As a child, it was limited to what was decided by my parents. As an adult in India, it was a matter of linear travel; from point A to point B without diversion. Here, there was a freedom to be without a destination…but no way to enjoy it. In the end, I was restricted either by destination or by means; my rootlessness had limits.

The first time I drove to another state, I found myself wanting to go further. So, instead of just entering the state and then leaving it, I opted to stop at a gas station, get some food at a drive-thru, and the drive back home. None of this was planned – it was a spur of the moment decision made based simply on the fact that I could.

Having a car and being free to use it as needed or desired is, for me, a symbol. A symbol of travel without limits. A symbol of my pride in being rootless. A symbol of my wanderlust without boundaries.

Oh, the Masks we Wear!

I have often wondered about all the roles we play in life. We are sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, a friend, sometimes a teacher or student, in school or at work. How overwhelming would that be; not knowing which role you’re playing at any one time, or mixing them up without realizing it. Indeed, that DOES happen.

For instance, many individuals may unwittingly play the role of a student in a doctor’s office, rather than a patient; listening and not clarifying, taking the doctor as the authority in the situation although – as a patient – you are the authority of your own body.

Carl Jung, prominent psychologist (and student of Sigmund Freud) spoke of the “Persona”; “a kind of mask, designed on the one hand to make a definite impression upon others, and on the other to conceal the true nature of the individual”.

Taking this as a basis, I believe that our person as DO hide our true selves, but that (i) we do not only have one Persona, and (ii) that we do have a choice about which Persona we use at different times. Given that my conceptualization of Jung’s Persona is different, I prefer to think in terms of “masks”.

As a student, we have facets that come to the fore; listening, open to learning, conscientious in completing our schoolwork and homework, and so forth. As a patient, these may shift – we increase the value of speaking, our conscientious now only focuses on the task of taking our medication or following suggestions, and we have a greater awareness of our bodies.

In social relationships, too, do we wear masks. These masks, depending on our relationship with the person in front of us, can have more or less solidity as well as have different facets. I may be more goofy and silly with one friend or group of friends, but be more mature with another. And there is always the case of being able to share some things with our friends that we don’t share with our family and/or vice versa.

Underneath all of these masks, however, is our true selves. A conscientious person, for instance, may be more so in one situation and less in another, but that does not mean they stop being conscientious altogether. I do not stop being mature completely with one group of friends, or cease making jokes with the other. The difference here is in levels.

Some may consider using these masks as hypocrisy – after all, one’s true self is not the same as one is portraying. A mask, however, obscures the true nature of a person, but it does not change it and does not express the opposite. If the person who speaks of politics is a Democrat, for instance, they may keep quiet about the same if they wish, but it is when they express support for the Republican party or its politics that we can consider the person a hypocrite.

To be a hypocrite, however, one has to be fully aware that they are going against their true selves – that which lies behind the mask. It is only when we know what facets lie behind the mask that we can decide the degree to which we want to express them, if at all.

For instance, I know I am empathetic. This may be more visible in my work as a therapist but slightly less as a teacher (at least in schools where information dissemination is more important than meaningful learning, but that is a topic for another post!) However, even if the level at which I express it may differ, that does not change the fact that I am empathetic.

Why is it so important to remember that we wear masks? Because the mask is not the whole of our true selves, but only a part of it. One’s true self is the foundation for our masks, not the other way around. And since no one knows our true selves as well as we do, we are the ones who decide how to create our masks the way that fits US best in the role we play.

Here I come to the second aspect of ‘masks’. I believe that our choice of mask isn’t only dependent on making a definite impression on others, but rather the aspects of our true selves that we are comfortable sharing with the other person.

For example, someone may choose to show a concrete mask to a person they have just met rather than a less solid one (as is often the case with individuals with trauma history). That might not lead to a definite impression. In fact, it would be possible that the individual left no impression on the person.

The importance of agency, or a person’s choice, figures into the masks we use. We choose how to create our mask based not on the impression we want to make, but how comfortable we would feel wearing it. The mask must conform to our true selves for it to be comfortable, and depending on the outside world for such information would be ineffective. Doing so could also confuse us about our own true selvesw or could lead to us being hypocrites.

Masks are not a bad thing – often we will meet individuals with whom some facet or another of our true selves would be incompatible. Masks allow us to interact with various people with minimal distress, and can be altered or exchanged for other masks if significant incompatibility is noticed.

It is when we wear the masks for ourselves, however, that they may be dangerous. If the masks begin to be the source of who our true selves are, there is a risk of us ignoring or even going directly against who we believe we are. In such a situation, one would in effect allow the world to suppress one’s true identity, increasing emotional and psychological distress in the process.

Perhaps the one of the most important things to remember is to take off one’s mask with themselves. Being free of masks allows us to breathe, to be ourselves in a wholistic and healthy way. To explore if the world outside had given us anything that we wanted to identify with, that we liked or disliked…to add to our true selves that becomes more detailed every day.

So, go ahead. Enjoy your ‘student mask’, ‘teacher mask’, ‘friend mask’, ‘daughter mask’, ‘son mask’…just remember to hang it up at the door when you get home.

The Culture of Privilege.

How long has it been since I last wrote a post? More than a couple of months…maybe more?

I guess this is part of my ADHD. But maybe it is more than that. Over the past month, I would be lying if I didn’t say that I have been somewhat overcome by the injustice that I have read about. Although I have been hearing about the multiple incidents of injustice faced by the African American population, it truly reached a head for me personally only recently. The most recent event in this fire of injustice against the African American population is the reversal of the judgment relating to Breonna Taylor’s murder.

I have always believed that our fight is against injustice. If we are fighting injustice, and it is painfully obvious that a majority of the injustice happens against African American individuals, it is our duty to speak out about it. It is our duty to advocate for those whose voices have been strangled by society. I do the same for the mentally ill, the individuals with disabilities, the LGBTQ+ population…all the minorities that face injustice. But I do it per person without ascribing myself to any particular population. Why? Because I am leery of assuming that all individuals from a particular minority deals with injustice.

I, personally, hold myself as an example. I have rarely faced any injustice because of my race, gender, or sexual orientation (I am a person of color, female, demisexual/asexual). Rather, in today’s context, I am privileged. I have lived in more than one country, obtained several degrees, and so forth. At the same time, I am privileged in other ways, too – I always have food to eat, clean clothes to wear, a roof over my head.

Thus, I find it hard-pressed to talk about being subject to injustice – I have had more than enough given to me in my life that I could never do so. And I am not alone, either – there are several individuals who, like me, belong to minorities but have not experienced injustice. So, when I protest injustice, I do so based on objective evidence – and there is no dearth of that – but also on whether or not the people being unjust are aware of it.

Speaking of privilege brings up a rather interesting dilemma. According to some theorists, stereotypes are neutral in nature, only becoming prejudice when they are given a value, i.e. good-bad. Prejudice is assumed to mean a negative value is imposed on a neutral descriptor of an individual. However, we can also see prejudice in the opposing direction – where a neutral descriptor is given a positive value. The tricky part is what I propose here – would privilege thus be another form of prejudice?

Think of it this way – being educated is a neutral descriptor of a person. There are still times when a person is considered “over-qualified” for a position that they are interested in because of their education. In this reference, being educated is actually being given a negative value, so this could be interpreted as prejudice.

But being educated is often given a positive value instead. So, someone who has been educated is viewed more favorably, and may thus be considered privileged. Following this logic, then, privilege is in fact the imposition of a positive value on a neutral concept just as prejudice is the imposition of a negative value on a neutral concept.

This then brings me back to why I treat every instance of injustice in its own right. Personally, this allows for me to treat the issue within the framework in which it exists, removing assumptions from the situation. I do not say that individuals are not victims of prejudice. But being a part of a population does not immediately mean that a person is a victim of prejudice. Likewise, being a part of a population does not necessarily mean that a person is privileged. What is important is: (i) the actual situation in which the topic arises, and (ii) how THE PERSON THEMSELVES identify.

Given the example above, someone may not be willing to accept the idea that they are privileged because of their education if that very education stands in the way of them getting a job. The situation is “getting a job”, and they identify THEIR having an extensive education as more of a hindrance in this situation than a privilege.

I am by no means a scholar or researcher in this field. However, I have always preferred to look at any concept from every viewpoint. I therefore sincerely hope that those who read this do not take umbrage in what is said. It is simply a thought that I would like to share.

Enjoy the Silence.

I have ADHD, I am considered an extrovert, and my being quiet has often led to others believing that I am depressed. The truth is, however…I recognize the importance of being with myself in silence.

How often do we face silence and either try to fill it with words or with doing something (like play with our phones)? Silence is difficult for most people – when we are with another person, we feel like there should be some form of communication happening. When there ISN’T anyone around, we seek them out virtually.

Admittedly, no man (or woman, or child) is an island. Social well-being is, after all, a part of our overall well-being. But words are not the only way we can be social. Indeed, verbal communication makes up only a quarter of what we are sharing with another.

Those silences? They are actually full of conversation, we just don’t realize it. Consider how some silences feel comfortable while others agitate us. How we perceive the silence depends on so many things – It might be the person we’re with, or the context, our expectations or what we think the other person expects. It may even be the impression we want to make.

Silence is, in fact, an opportunity to use our non-verbal skills to express what we would use words for. I recall sitting next to my sister in silence one day. She sat there on her phone, I sat next to her, desperately restraining myself from telling her “you know, it’s rude to be on your phone when I’m sitting right here. If nothing, at least we could DO something together”. I knew from experience, however, that verbalizing this often led to arguments which I did not want to waste my time on.

So, I tried something new – I turned towards her at an angle, took my phone out and fiddled with it, but looked up at her in intervals. At one point, she caught my eye and asked, “what?” My response was simple – “if you’re done, can we do something together?” I had not said anything to catch her attention, and yet she heard me loud and clear. There is a reason that non-verbal communication makes up more than half of our communication (if you’re wondering, the other quarter of communication is para-verbal, sounds that replace words (like grunts, or “m-hmm”).

Of course, at times it is silence because there IS no one to talk to; an imposed silence (unless you listen to music, watch something electronically, or talk to yourself). However, even in this case, silence can be valuable. It is in silence that we can focus our attention inwards. Physically, our senses do not need to work as hard as they do otherwise – there is nothing to hear, nothing to say. No observations to make of the person in front of us. Instead, we can hear sounds we would not have paid attention to otherwise, natural (birds singing, trees and leaves rustling) or not (whirring refrigerator or air conditioner). In fact, one of the strategies for mindfulness involves focusing on what our senses perceive in complete silence so as to validate existing in the present.

Meanwhile, silence does not necessarily mean inactivity – we may not move around much, but our minds most definitely are. What has happened, what is happening, what will happen…our minds do not stop. When we are ensconced in silence, with our senses demanding less of us, we have the opportunity to direct our thoughts the way WE want them to go, without having them directed by unconscious processes or emotional states. Self-reflection, questioning the validity of how we thought about events or experiences we had, gleaning from them what we learned and where we confirmed our old strengths and found new ones…silence can involve a great deal more growth than we give it credit for.

So embrace silence. Use it. It isn’t an unnecessary and redundant vacuum – it is full of possibilities.

Is it Time for a Change?

I have been working in the same place for 3 years now. I am a clinician and a clinical trainer. Simply put, I see clients and I also train others who will be seeing clients. This unique combination of roles came about when my employers realized that I had experience as a therapist AND as a teacher. Given my desire to help as many people as possible, even those who aren’t my clients, this dual role suited me perfectly.

At this point in my life I find myself in a quandary, however. In terms of career growth, it may well be time for me to move on. I am aware that I could be paid better, and that I am a valid candidate for jobs that I always wanted to take on. I would also have many more needs addressed if I moved on than if I stayed where I am. Although my clientele would change, I would still be helping people. Meanwhile, it could also address my pre-existing assumptions about the types of clients I would work with in different places.

Then again, it will be difficult to find a place where I can do what I am able to here. I have carved such a deep niche for myself here that I know my departure would significantly affect the organization that took a chance with me. This IS my first job after my MS degree, and in the US, after all. Meanwhile, this dual role of clinician and trainer came about to address difficulties that I myself was facing at work. At the same time, several individuals at the executive level have actively worked on me getting a higher salary. A part of me, then, feels guilty about leaving.

There is another, more personal, concern – being a Third-Culture Adult, it is often hard to stay in one place for too long – moving around is a natural part of who I am. The query, then, is whether or not my desire to move is actually based on self-development or giving in to a personal inclination which, in the end, could lead to me shooting myself in the foot.

This has led to me looking for other jobs but not applying for any. I notice a shift in my attention, however, from obstinately sticking to my current job to exploring other options. As my family has said in the past, just looking at other options doesn’t mean I’m going to get another job right away. And that is true. I do, however, know that there are quite a few places that would hire me if they knew I was looking for a job, my visa needs notwithstanding. I am licensed, hold three Masters and two Bachelors degrees, and have been working with clients from the age of 4 to 58 years the whole time that I have been working. I pride myself in being able to take on various tasks not related to my “job position” when it’s needed. Also, there is always a need for mental health professionals in some part of the world.

It has taken me 3 years to begin considering a change, and it has slowly phased into my life. First, looking at Indeed online. Then, downloading the app. Now, editing my resumé, which – ironically – is needed for my current job. The more I do, the more my ambivalence grows. I want to leave, but I don’t want to leave. Once again, bringing to mind simultaneously the fact that we all face ambivalence with regards to behavior change, and that we can never be our own therapists!

Today’s post is not about a therapeutic approach or how I observe and experience the world around me. Rather, it is a self-exploration that has yet to reach a conclusion. Stay tuned for further developments!

Kids Say the Darndest Things: The Case for Keeping it Simple

People say as you grow older, things become clearer thanks to our life experiences. I agree with that, but I noticed something different, too. I think we all could do with a little regression. Why would I suggest that we all go against our physical, cognitive and emotional progress? Because progress also means elaboration, which is sometimes completely unnecessary, or even harmful.

Think about it. How often have you heard a kid say something that startles you? Sometimes, they make you think about something in a whole new light, or answer a question in a way that we didn’t even think of ourselves. And perhaps the reason that it strikes us is because what we were pondering for hours, days, or maybe even years, was answered in less than 5 minutes by someone decades younger than us. And it stuns us because of how simple it was.

Kids wait for us to tell them what we think. But as adults, we start believing we can read another person’s thoughts. We plan meticulously how to create something, kids just leap into making it (and sometimes do it better than we ever could!) We keep thinking of success as a long, drawn-out and endless journey; kids celebrate successes every day, sometimes with us accompanying them in doing so.

We naturally evolve as we grow. Of course we see things as more complex, that not everything is black and white, it’s not all or nothing, etc, etc. Sometimes we ARE right, it’s not so simple. Even when it isn’t, however, just how far down the rabbit hole are we going to go? We think a single thought, go into “if a then b”, then it becomes “unless b is c, then if a then c”…our thoughts go from just a single thought to a web of thoughts, each with their own emotions, physical responses and behaviors. Kids say “but what if we just act on a and see what happens?”

In “The Value of Being Immature”, I mention that kids act and learn from consequences of their actions. As adults, we try to preempt negative consequences by thinking about what may happen if we do something. Sometimes we are able to avoid negative consequences, at other times we can’t. Because we can’t predict the result of our actions – the world is not under our control, nor can we predict how it will react to our actions.

If we do face negative consequences, we don’t just try again later, or think “ok, I’m not doing THAT again!” and try to think of another action instead – basically, what a kid might do. Instead, we tear apart our actions, we berate ourselves for not thinking about something in advance, we don’t try again or try to find another solution completely different from what we did earlier. We think and think about courses of action, worry ourselves about what could happen, and sometimes decide not to try at all.

How often have we thought about doing something, ‘predicted’ it would go badly, and stopped ourselves from doing it? It took me at least 15 years to start writing this blog, worrying about how people would react and deciding it was safer to keep my thoughts to myself. I realized I was getting suffocated by all these ideas that I wanted to share, so I finally acted. The world would react as it will.

It took even longer to tell my family how I felt about the roles they were either intentionally or unintentionally making me play which were at opposites to my true nature. My fear of excessively negative – and very hurtful – reactions was winning this fight, but suppressing my desire to say something hurt more, so I took the plunge. Sure enough, I had to weather a storm of negative consequences. But I felt freer, and over time they understood my point.

Kids truly are doing what we could benefit from doing ourselves. Speaking their minds because no one else can. Acting as they see fit because experiencing consequences themselves is the only way they can learn. Feeling how they feel without guilt or shame for feeling that way. Because every action has consequences, and we have no control over the response we will get (nor can we predict it). Because even as kids, we have the capacity to try again, to tolerate negative consequences and to terminate or replace our actions accordingly (again, with accompanying changes in thought and emotion). Because as adults, we do have more choices in how to think, act, and feel – and often the best choice is what we did as kids.

Just do it. Whatever will be will be.

The Value of Being Immature

I am a 39 years old woman. I have often, however, heard how I am naive, or child-like, or even immature. For the longest time, I resented being told these. It’s amazing how our perspectives can change with a little self-reflection.

It occurred to me one day that it is just as easy for me to be an adult as it is for me to be a child. Since I believe that no one thing can exist without its opposite (e.g. we know sadness because we know what happiness feels like, we know light because we’ve seen dark), it started to make sense that with being mature, we are naturally childish at times.

Thinking about it, I have always been able to develop relationships with kids. Indeed, when I started my current job, my clients were children for the most part. Out of 48 clients, I had – at one point – only 2 young adults. All the rest were between the ages of 4 and 10 years.

My child-like nature is what I use when I connect with my younger clients. I maintain confidentiality even with a 4 years old child (although I do tell them that I can help them tell something to their caregiver if they want). I play games with them, join them in their excitement at the little things, and – perhaps most importantly – ask parents not to consider behaviors as “bad” but rather as exploratory.

Exploration is one of the ways we learn. We try something out, if it leads to good consequences we keep doing it. If it doesn’t, we stop. Classic operant conditioning, right? It’s something we do throughout our lives, the difference being that we are capable of thinking before taking action as adults while, as children, we act and then learn from the consequences.

That doesn’t mean that we are always insightful as adults, though – we’ve all attempted something in our lives that hasn’t led to good consequences and decided not to do that again. After all, we are not omniscient, we can’t predict everything in the world. So, sometimes our explorations are much like those that kids do. Yes, sometimes we are ALL childish.

Going back to my belief that one thing can only exist because we know of its opposite, we often know we are being mature if we look at times when we were childish. The difference, however is HOW we look at it. What if we looked at our previous behavior without judgment? Not with “I can’t believe I ever thought that!” but rather with a sense of “well, that was I thought at the time” or “I learned something new from that”? And with the acceptance that taking action and facing negative consequences of it can happen again, and that would be OK?

Essentially, being childish isn’t a bad thing. Because it is a part of who we are – we had to be a child to get to where we are today. Valuing the child in us doesn’t negate our maturity – it adds to it.

More than a Diagnosis: a Different Approach.

I hold a very basic principle that guides my work as a therapist – everyone is born good, it is their actions that can be considered “bad” (maladaptive, destructive, violent, etc). Even personality disorders are developed in response to events that an individual experiences.

Take, for example, borderline personality disorder. There is a significant amount of research that correlates trauma history with borderline personality disorder. This is not solely traumatic events in adulthood, but also in childhood. Why do I bring the distinction up? Because I believe childhood trauma precedes the development and presence of Borderline Personality Disorder. Is it not possible, then, for an individual to develop Borderline Personality Disorder in response to events they have experienced?

That’s not to say that experiences and actions cannot become habits and then patterns of behavior that an individual is now identified with. William Durant (not Aristotle) once said “we are what we repeatedly do”. When an individual continuously reacts to the world around them in the same way, they may well say that it’s part of who they are. That can be a good thing or a dangerous one. I often find myself rephrasing “I’m loud” to “I talk loudly”, “I’m stupid to I do stupid things” or “I’m impulsive to “I do impulsive things”. This is, however, a difficult activity.

Why rephrase at all? Simply because we are more than what we do. The moment a person realizes that something they do does not define who they are, the behavior becomes a little less permanent and the individual now has greater power to change it. It is definitely easier for a person to moderate their volume or manage their impulsivity when it isn’t considered part of who they are but just something they do.

The distinction between identity and action brings to mind another concept – labelling. Indeed, I would probably never give a diagnosis if it wasn’t for insurance reasons. Why? Because there are no two people with the same diagnosis, meeting the same criteria for the diagnosis, whose circumstances and experiences of them are exactly them same.

Diagnoses do, however give us something – Looking at the criteria for any diagnosis, they are all associated with visible actions and reactions. If this is the case, then what I think makes even more sense; separating the “I am” from “I do” makes it even easier to address all diagnoses, including personality disorders and even psychoses. As we address behaviors, managing symptoms and utilizing healthy coping strategies become second nature as they replace behaviors that have been detached from a person’s identity and improved on. A healthier cycle of behavior develops, and an awareness of this healthier cycle then is developed within the member using mindfulness.

This is the way I have approached my work. It has worked in some cases, and not in others. Then again, who said one approach fits all? Wouldn’t that be labelling in itself?