Working through an issue

Oh, I have a part of me that gets so mad. I can feel it now, in my body, over a work related issue where I have tried so hard to move a process along so that deadlines can be met efficiently but no movement is happening. I can’t make my boss enter the data so I can take the next step in the process. I can remind her. I can request that the data be entered. But I cannot make her open the program and do it.

How do I feel? In my body I feel stuck and blocked. I can feel a tight band all around my solar plexus and my chest feels like it both aches and is made of wood. My throat is tightening and my jaw is clenching. I feel frustrated and powerless.

What am I saying to myself all about this. What are my jackals howling?

Well, it’s not fair.

I am trying to do my job and I can’t rely on getting the basic support I need to get on with it.

In fact, I just can’t do the next step without this person doing their job. I feel angry that she didn’t respond to my requests – and even when she has acknowledged that it needs to be done, it is still not done.

How am I feeling while my jackals are howling?

I feel stymied. My head is shaking.

Like, how hard can it be just to enter the damn data – I can’t understand why it hasn’t been done. I feel confused.

I feel worried that now the information for my section is going to to incomplete and I will have to explain this over and over again to students and staff – and if I say “Well, my manager didn’t enter the data, it sounds like and excuse or whinging’. I feel despondent about having to go through that – either not explaining or explaining – either way.

I hate having someone else make my life more difficult. I resent that.

I just want her to do what she said she would do. I want her to honour our agreement. How can I rely on her word if she doesn’t do what she says she will do? I feel unsafe and like I am at the mercy of her whims and ability to cope with her job.

I believed that she would do what she said she would do. I feel disappointed and now I don’t know if I can trust her on other things too so I feel vulnerable.

I feel fearful of not knowing how things will play out.

But what’s actually real here?

In NVC the next kind of move we make here, is to state the “issue” as an observation. An observation is a clear statement of the “facts” something a camera might record it.

In our everyday life, we are usually not dealing with situations that demand an immediate flight/fight response, and this leaves our mind with a lot more time for generating thoughts and images about possible negative outcomes. “What if” is a familiar refrain during challenging times. Sometimes these are called “the stories we tell ourselves”. Part of the power of our ‘old stories’ is that they seem true.  This is a moment when the power of pausing and getting curious can be life-changing.

Marci Shimoff, author of the New York Times bestseller Happy for No Reason: 7 Steps to Being Happy from the Inside Out says

Don’t believe everything you think. We humans have what psychologists call a negativity bias, which means we’re hardwired to pay more attention to our disturbing thoughts and experiences than to our positive ones. While this wiring was useful when we were cavewomen trying to survive in the wild, today it just makes us more likely to go into freak-out mode and get stuck there.

Simply understanding that negativity sticks to our brains like Velcro and positivity slides off like Teflon can help you take your worries less seriously. People who are "happy for no reason" know how to over-ride their internal alarm systems when necessary. This gives them more energy to deal effectively with what’s actually happening in their lives. So when you start to spin out and "awful-ize" your situation, interrupt the downward spiral of worry and anxiety by questioning your negative thoughts.

Just because you think something doesn’t make it true.

We can choose to stop and ask the simple question: “Do I absolutely know that this thought is true?” So simple, so powerful: Pause, breathe, sense the feeling, examine the thought and ask,

“ Do I have clear evidence that this thought/image is the only possible interpretation of the situation”.

Once you have answered this question then it becomes possible to frame an observation.  We can powerfully alter our experience by recognizing that the thought/image we are generating is ONE of MANY possible true “stories”. The facts are direct, simple and in a surprising way “always helpful”. As psychologist Carl Rogers said: “the facts are always friendly”. Note that “friendly” does not mean desirable, rather it means that life can unfold positively when we relate to the facts without getting hooked by our embellishing stories.

So here goes:

The data I need to complete my task is not entered into my Section profile and the instructions I have receive state that this data needs to entered and approved by COB today.

Now how am I feeling?

Now my typing is getting slower. I am feeling sad. Tears sit on top of my diaphragm. I feel tired. I need some ease. I need some ease within me and I need ease in my life – less pushing, exerting, efforting. I actually feel exhausted with the effort of wanting things to work out right or according to plan.

Getting closer to my needs

Ahh…I am slowing down even more. I can still feel the physical pain in my solar plexus. It is a sad, sad ache. But the anger is gone. Tears are there now. I can sense a very small child in me that is desperate to ‘make things right ~ so no-one is upset, angry, crazy or being mean” to “bring some order into the chaos and randomness” so that it is safe and predictable where I live and to live with ease and safety. I can sense her deep, deep need for reassurance that the world can be trusted in some way. I sense my anger is driven by fear. The fear is scared of being scared or vulnerable so my anger feels stronger and more proactive in the world. It seems like my anger is trying to take care of me – to protect my vulnerability from being more hurt or disappointed. Anger is my heart’s armour. Pausing with that. Feeling friendlier t
owards my angry part. Acknowledging it’s protective role.

Hmmm… touching in on my needs…

trust

safety

predictability – that some kind of order exists and is honoured

ease

Yes. I sense that I want to be able to have enough trust in my life so that I can have some level of certainty or predictability in relationships. I realise that I am looking for that trust outside – in my interpersonal world – as that is where I would have sought it as young child.

Visioning

If, I take some time now to envision those needs as met…interesting…I can’t envision those needs being met externally to me.

Now I see my next step…asking myself if I can find a way to meet these needs within me, even when the external circumstances, feel unsafe, unpredictable and I feel unsure if I can trust the words or actions of another (be it a person, an organisation or even a policy, law or cultural rule). Hmmm… by trust I notice I mean that agreements will be kept. Ahh…I realise I like to to know if something has changed for the other person so that I realise I also value being informed of changes – is that transparency?

Now as I Focus inwardly I realise that a big part of who I am and how I define myself is around “trust”. I really value that my word counts, I value relying on my word – both to myself and in the world. I value alignment between words and actions. So, as I slow down and sense inwardly, I realise that it is not so much that the situation has not played out how I was told it would – the agreement has changed – but that there are 2 unmet needs.

One is that I would enjoy acknowledgement of the changes and how they affect me. That is agreements can and do change (that is reality) and I would enjoy hearing the other person say something like, “Hey Leona, I know we agreed to …. but things have changed for me now. I can see that the changes I have made (or want to make) do affect you and I just want to acknowledge that with you.”

The second is then a clarification of where we are at now.

So, yes, I feel a real shift when I hold in my body how much I value clarity and acknowledgement. I sense a kind of groundedness in there now. A settling.

So, I check in now with this place, this felt sense, that holds all about trust in my body. Is there anything more she needs me to know? Oh! She just showed me that when I don’t say, in the world, what my needs are around this then I am not acknowledging this vital part of me. It’s like I am doing to myself what I am saying others are doing to me.

What can I do? Making requests/responding

Hmm…so even if I am not, immediately, able to have this conversation interpersonally, I can be with place. I can acknowledge my own needs internally – with myself. Something like:

When I notice the data hasn’t been entered as agreed and I cannot complete my job I feel uncertain about how this will affect my Section, students and me for next semester. I really value clarity and acknowledgement so I get why I feel frustrated when there is no communication from my boss about why she hasn’t done what she said she would do and fearful of what the consequences might be because of this. I also acknowledge that I have done everything in my power to honour my commitments in this situation.

I can also ask myself, “what would come in my body if this were all solved?” or “How would I feel if these needs were met?”

When I sense some inner pain/upset/stuckness about something in my life along with thoughts/images that were sustaining the experience I remember Gene Gendlin’s idea of letting your body go to “the way it will feel tomorrow or the next day when this is all resolved”, I felt an immediate and substantial relief. My body knows how to recall/recreate/enter that other way of being. One could also say: “go to the place where your body knows how you will feel when this situation is all resolved”. Let yourself have that feeling for a while. Give some time for your body to be with that “all ok” feeling. Such a life-giving reservoir is right there within you! We can learn to tap into this capacity by practicing it. Sometimes it is most helpful to step out of the thinking in this way and just let the body use this ability.