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BONUS! Practical NLP, by Arman Darini,
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Enjoy reading this
sample online Tip:
First Key to Self Mastery:
Response-Ability
by Arman Darini, Ph.D.
July 26, 2006
In the previous article I showed how you can skillfully
communicate negative emotions in a way that deepens your
relationships, instead of creating havoc as it usually
happens. Today I am going to focus on one of three keys to
self mastery - owning the responsibility. The trainers at
our University all agree - if we were able to change only
one thought pattern in the world, it would have to be giving
back to everyone full responsibility for their actions,
thoughts and emotions. It's that important.
What is responsibility and why is it important?
Response-ability is very simply your ability to respond to
the world. Whenever you claim responsibility, your claim
your power to do, to influence, to act, to change. Whenever
you deny responsibility, you deny your power to respond,
leaving yourself powerless. For example, if you say: "He
made me angry," - you imply that the anger was creating in
you by him. If you say: "The leaky faucet irritates me," -
you imply that the irritation was created in you by the
dripping water. In plain language you are saying that how
you feel was caused by someone or something else. These
shifts of responsibility away from yourself are perversions
of reality (a more technical term is distortion of reality).
Another name for shifting responsibility is blaming.
Blaming exists because it is an effective way to
manipulate people. The often unconscious logic of blaming
goes like this: "I feel bad, you are responsible for making
me feel bad, now you are responsible for making me feel
good. In any case, you owe me a favor." Clearly spelled out
this way it becomes obvious that blaming is just a power
game. There is also an additional piece of helplessness to
it: "Since you caused my feelings, they are out of my
control. I am helpless to change anything and no effort is
required from me." So, blaming is a way to preserve status
quo and to transfer all responsibility for change to another
party. Highly manipulative and effective in the short run.
Highly disempowering in the long run.
Seems simple? Then think how many times in the last week
have you said to yourself: "This is annoying" or "This is
upsetting" or a similar phrase? Denying response-ability
every time. Next time try this phrase instead: "I am
choosing to feel annoyed" or "I am deciding to feel upset".
If someone in your presence says: "She is pissing me off",
help them out by asking: "Why are you deciding to feel
pissed off?" Be careful with such phrasing though, many
people are so stuck in the constant cycles of
blaming-helplessness, that they will not even understand
what you mean at first.
I would like to start an empowering mental virus of
personal responsibility. Here is how it works. First,
forward this article to the people you spend most of your
time with - friends, family, colleagues. Then, after they
have read it, agree with each other to call out the refusal
of personal responsibility, whenever you notice it. So, if
you hear each other say something that denies
responsibility, call it out: "You are choosing to be
powerless right now." See how fast you learn to notice and
re-claim your response-ability to the world.
