Sunday, October 21, 2018

Observing life, Sharing where I am at ...............






Observing life,
Sharing where I am at
&
Holding my own finger print on my soul …….

Often I see humans reacting to another with negative words & actions.
These are driven by their own emotions not by the behaviour of the other person.
I am concerned about this.

Thinking doesn’t come into such interactions.
Thinking, such as, 'how do I need to respond to be helpful to this person’,
is often by past.
It is often just discharging their own feeling into put-down comments or harsh words. 
(and aggressive behaviour sometimes).

I observe these happening by parent to child, & by adults partner to partner.

Reflection::
I led a Training Day for 68 School Teaching Assistant (TA’s).
In their reflective feedback there was several outcomes for them - such as::
When confronted by difficult or disturbing behaviour,
we need to think ‘what is the child feeling’ rather than their behaviour.

'We can see a persons behaviour
but
we can’t see their upstream'

THINKING !
I often repeat that 'feelings travel to our brains four time quicker than thinking'.
(ask yourself if that is true for you?)

I believe we can train ourselves in this area.
We can learn to train our responses to think before we verbally or physically react.
This comes by awareness training followed by the development of skills.
AWARENESS must always precede SKILLS.
ACT -  not REACT.

Working with young offenders all my life, and older offenders too, 
I am aware that when a teacher/social worker/youth worker is in interactions with a big aggressive individual, 
they often then do think before they act or react.
They quickly become more aware that their actions could result in a physical confrontation - dangerous to themselves. 
We ALL can become more aware in those situations because unthinking responses can be dangerous..

Teachers, parents, leaders in positions of authority can be bullies - misusing their power over a another.
In the workplace this can result in poor performance, dysfunctional team-work, absenteeism, and/or mental or physical health outcomes.

Particularly distressing to me and children is when unaware adults or bully behaviour damages a child into adulthood.
Damage can be caused to a child's self-confidence, self esteem & their developing ability to effectively build lasting relationships.

We all have an upstream.
We can learn from considering our own upstream, as bad as it could be, and learning from it.

It is never the behaviour of another person that ‘makes me angry’ .  
We can never be right in saying “it’s their fault” - our behaviour is never 'their fault' 
because we are each responsible for our own behaviour.

All of us have situations in our lives which can be sensitive delicate or risky.
If we wish to manage our interactions better and be purposeful to others, we can change.
The change needed is to develop awareness of our own emotions.
We need to be able get into contact with our own feelings.
Giving a feeling a name is helpful - it start to help us to manage the feeling rather than it take over - take control.
Feeling word Examples::
Threatened
Disgusted
Ignored
Rejected
Insulted
Put down
Disregarded
Apposed 

So we feel the feeling.
Feelings are not good or bad - they are signals for us to read.
Then we decide what to say or display in terms of facial expression / body language.
All behaviour has an objective so need to consider this.
Usually there are a number of reasons why the above examples are communicated to us.
This other person is outpouring their feelings.
We can’t do better than consider how the person is feeling - not only being aware of their behaviour.
They could be feeling insecure (or many other negative feeling) and disguising it behind the behaviour. 

One technique I have developed over the years of working with explosive young & older persons is using body language.
I have often turned around, beckoning with my arm & walking away saying “Come on lets sit down & talk about it …..”
I recall this happening when someone was threatening me with a large hammer.
Standing is far more of a confrontation - sitting down is far more non threatening to both persons.
I start to take deep breaths because otherwise we can start to take shallow breaths and become light headed.

Think about feelings. 
Become aware of their feelings. 
Identify with their feelings.
I use the ‘I’ word not the ‘YOU’ word.
“I feel for you in your upset” rather than "You are upset" - or “You are angry”.
THINK resolve rather than punishment.
The behaviour you are experiencing could be obnoxious and aggressive but
thinking FEELINGS is a better resolve than confronting the aggression.

All this can be exhausting for both persons.
The main objective now is to settle the person down & to be at ease as much as possible.
Our words & tone of voice are vital in these minutes.

Our compassion, empathy & concern are our main assets during these times.




BHP