Mind Gym (13 page)

People in this quadrant are low on confidence and high on negativity, pessimism, and cynicism. Being around them can be a demoralizing experience. If your point totals place you in this quadrant, you don’t have high hopes of others and don’t feel good about yourself either. As a result, you tend to reject others as a way of protecting yourself from being hurt. In fact, you’ve probably already stopped reading this book, because you believe it can’t possibly help you.

When we are being kind to ourselves and generous-spirited with others, relationships are likely to flourish; we’re much more likely to solve problems than apportion blame, take responsibility rather than play the victim, deal with an issue instead of giving up. Ideally, we’d spend all our time in the
I’m okay, you’re okay
quadrant. In reality, most of us move between the quadrants as events, situations, and people smack us around in life. Equally, we all have an anchor quadrant, one where we spend most of our time.

But knowing where you are (and your current mind-set) is half the journey. Knowing what to do about it is the next challenge. What follows are practical ideas for making the change to an
I’m okay, you’re okay
mind-set.

Your new motto is “I see the best in me.” Here are five practical ways to help you live that motto and restore faith in yourself.

Psychologist Christopher Peterson found that explicitly acknowledging our part in making good things happen helps shift us to more of an
I’m okay
way of thinking.
⁵
To do so, try these approaches:

Write down twenty things you’ve done well in the last month. Review the list. What does this tell you that you’re good at (other than writing lists)? Try to find at least ten significant things that you can be proud of.

Every day write down in a journal five things you’ve done well—it doesn’t matter if they were important or challenging tasks (working out hard at the gym, delivering a critical presentation at work) or mundane or routine tasks (mowing the lawn, completing a Sudoku puzzle, making a killer pot of chili). Once a week look at the list and identify ten more things that you’re good at. Even better, write down the part you played in making these good things happen. So, if you’ve written “had a good workout at the gym,” add a description of how you made it happen: “This happened because I set myself the goal to leave work at six-thirty
P.M.
I also avoided the strong temptation to crawl home to the sofa and drink beer. And I kept reminding myself of how good I would feel.” Writing down these items may seem unnecessary. It isn’t. Those who do the writing report a much bigger benefit, especially if they stick with it. If you want to move out of
I’m not okay
, get a notebook and start scribbling.

When the problem seems big, it’s easy to feel helpless. Consider what you can do that will make a positive difference to that problem, no matter how small the impact will be. Then do it. Concentrating on action (and then patting yourself on the back when you complete the task you set for yourself) is a productive way to appreciate your value a bit more.

As one successful entrepreneur explained, “I figured out what I like doing and then found someone to pay me to do it.” That’s good advice. Maybe you’re a rock star in the kitchen. Or you do stellar presentations at work. Or you’re the envy of everyone at the gym or on the dance floor. Most of us shine at something. Your challenge is to spend more time doing those things. Write down the five things you do best. And then figure out how to reorganize your life so you can spend more time doing them.

There are people out there who like you, appreciate you, and look up to you. They may not be making their admiration completely obvious, so you may not be picking up their signals. From the smiling lady on the bus to the client who doesn’t complain (which is rather out of character for him), pay attention to the small signs and signals that are large indicators of the good you’re spreading. And if you don’t know what signals to look for, pay attention to your own behavior around someone you like or admire.

Things go wrong. It happens to all of us. The difference is in how you speak and think when things do go wrong. To get to
I’m okay
, put the trash talk and negative thinking in the garbage can. Learn to view negative experiences as temporary: one missed deadline doesn’t mean you are always late with everything; the occasional memory lapse doesn’t mean you can’t be trusted to remember important information. You don’t hold on to trash forever; you deal with it daily. Therefore, minimize your daily missteps. So what if you forgot to buy milk? So what if you forgot to call to schedule your nail appointment? Does it really matter in the bigger scheme?

You may not have a cheerleader to keep your thoughts positive and your spirits lifted—especially when other people can, and will, let you down. From time to time you’ll have moments when you view others negatively. But if you start giving everyone the benefit of the doubt, you’ll be on your way toward changing your relationship mind-set in a positive direction and moving to
You’re okay
.

Assume the best realistic motivation behind another person’s behavior. What does that mean? It means be positive. Assume that person is hopeless rather than cunning, nervous rather than angry, shy rather than rude, and under pressure rather than vindictive.

Guessing someone’s true intention based on imperceptible behaviors can get you into serious trouble. Instead, why not assume the positive as a default? If it’s too difficult to assume the best, then simply don’t attempt any interpretation at all. Note the person’s behavior and move on.

It’s easy to concentrate on what’s wrong with people. Try focusing on what’s good about them. Everyone has great qualities, which are often the reasons why we like them in the first place. Consciously think of what’s good about a person when you’re talking with them (or communicating with them in any way—in correspondence or in conversation). By itself, this will help improve your relationship.

Two examples don’t make a pattern. We all make mistakes, especially when we’re trying to change. It’s easy and tempting to size people up on a mistake or two and hold it up as proof (at least to yourself) that there’s something wrong with them. Watch out for a person’s positive behaviors too, before making up your mind about what kind of person you think they are.

Do people often let you down? Maybe your expectations are so high that they always will. This doesn’t mean that you have to accept poorly executed work or friends who don’t show up when they said they would. It does, however, suggest that your consistently high standards may be damaging your relationships. Lower them.

If you can’t lower your expectations, at least forgive quickly and easily. Otherwise, you will spend much of your energy feeling angry or upset about people letting you down, which isn’t much fun. Forgiveness doesn’t mean excusing what happened in the past; instead, it means allowing the relationship to move forward.

Your friends, family, and coworkers are accustomed to how you are and have expectations of how you will behave toward them and around them. In fact, there may be some kind of positive payoff for them in you remaining how you are. If you decide to change your behavior, it will change things for them too. And they might not like that.

For example, perhaps you’ve always had a negative perception of yourself and a positive view of others (i.e., you operate from an
I’m not okay, you’re okay
mind-set). You have probably been very attentive to the people around you, and they have gotten used to that. They may believe that your incredibly attentive behavior is your way of demonstrating love for them. Imagine then what happens when your behavior changes and you stop being so clingy. The people around you may experience a sense of loss. Your attentiveness may have actually made their lives easier. As a result, even while they are glad that you are feeling better about yourself, they may resist the changes. So, be prepared to encounter resistance and to offer reassurance to those around you.

The
I’m okay, you’re okay
perspective provides you with insight into how you think about relationships. This means you can choose to think differently in order to have better, longer-lasting relationships. Understanding these perspectives also has a surprise benefit: it tells you how others want to be treated.

While you were reading this chapter thinking about your relationship mind-set, you probably pinpointed a lot of other people’s mind-sets. If you know how others view relationships and themselves, then you know exactly how to treat them—and how to form a deeper relationship.

Finally, from Woody Allen, for those of you who are still thinking
It’s them, not me
. . .

“Doc, my brother’s crazy. He thinks he’s a chicken.”

“Well, why don’t you turn him in?”

“I would, but I need the eggs.”

If you’re not already in the
I’m okay
mind-set, these two tools will help get you there:

Think of a category of people you know, such as colleagues, clients, or college friends. On a sheet of paper divided into three columns, write down everyone you know in this category (don’t miss anyone significant), and place each person’s name beneath one of the following three column headings: “People I Think Are Great,” “People I Think Are Okay,” and “People I Don’t Like.”

Which column is the longest? This is a good indication of how you see relationships. If you have a
You’re okay
mind-set, the longest lists will likely be in the first two columns, ideally with the “People I Think Are Great” being the longest. But if the “People I Think Are Okay” and “People I Don’t Like” columns are longer, it suggests your relationship mind-set is not as conducive to having great relationships as it could be. Try these two steps to change that:

H
ave you ever tried to trace the events of a broken relationship to figure out when it started to go wrong? Was it the time you scratched your partner’s car (honestly, you could barely see it) and didn’t tell her for weeks? Or when you went away for the weekend even though you knew your brother was going into the hospital? Or when you had that awkward conversation with your boss about her not giving you feedback before a big presentation?

Whatever you came up with, you’re probably wrong. How can we be so sure? Because it’s not the high drama or grand passions that make or break a relationship; it’s the small stuff, the almost imperceptible micro signals that you send constantly throughout the day.
¹
The relationship likely started to go wrong months earlier, when you were asked a simple question like “Would you like a cup of coffee?”

Surprising as it may sound, how you replied to this question may have sealed your relationship’s fate. Because how you respond to the thousands of apparently inconsequential comments people make every day determines what happens to your relationships far more than a big blowout argument. Indeed, so vital are these tiny signals to the health of a relationship that observing them in the arguments of a married couple for just fifteen minutes can provide a prediction of future divorce with over 90 percent accuracy.

In the early 1980s psychologist John Gottman was wondering why some married couples stayed together while others broke apart. Obviously he wasn’t the first person to ponder that question. However, he is the only one who raised millions of dollars to build an apartment in Chicago filled with hidden cameras and microphones in an attempt to answer it. In his
Big Brother
–style house, Professor Gottman watched closely as a series of couples went about their daily interactions. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but he was expecting something more than the routine chitchat of everyday life. Here is an example of what he saw and heard:

After a while of watching this so-called everyday life, Professor Gottman was reaching the point of calling it quits—and calling the experiment a failure. But that’s when something interesting happened. Before throwing in the towel, he took one last closer look and, like a forensic detective, found the answer he was seeking. It was buried in the tiny details of those seemingly meaningless and inconsequential exchanges between people. As meaningless as they seemed on the surface, at a deeper level, the exchanges were highly nuanced, emotional signals, or what Gottman called “bids.”