Because you provide human services professionally, many of your adult and child
clients, patients, students, and cases will be significantly (moderately to
greatly) split, psychologically. That will have a major impact on what they need
and expect from you, and how they relate to you and other providers. It also
will shape how you and they evaluate the service you provide them. The less
pleasant reality is that you also may be
significantly split, and not know it.
What does
"major impact" mean?
Perspective
A basic premise throughout this site is that all humans normally grow
a "modular" personality, composed of many dynamic subselves.
However - we're trained to experience ourselves in the world as me - one
person. This is like viewing all the members of a sports team or orchestra as
"me", the group. Our subselves act like a group of independent humans
- they ally, fight, ignore, compete, care for, fear, enjoy, admire, communicate,
manipulate, and dis/trust each other. Much of this happens out of our conscious
awareness.
Dominant subselves, or personality "parts" can influence the
behavior of our whole inner family - i.e. most adults' and kids' behavior
is strongly shaped by certain subselves who are the most opinionated and
motivated. You probably someone who is
"fear based" - who lives life anxiously or over-controlled,
constantly waiting for the next painful thing to happen. Their inner family
is dominated by one or more personality parts who (1) see the world (or
certain situations) as a dangerous and painful, and (2) don't trust their
inner-family's leadership to keep them out of danger.
You probably know other people whose "modular mind" is dominated
by extra-guilty and shamed subselves. These
people relate to others in a characteristically defensive and subservient,
or arrogant and egotistical, way. You know intellectual, creative,
impulsive, driven, and angry people. Others are playful, seductive,
optimistic, aloof, clingy, single-minded, and so
on. How would people who know you well describe your dominant
subselves?
If you haven't recently, read five Web pages now, and return. They describe
your inner
family of subselves. Note your reaction to what you read about your true
Self and your false self, and then return
here. From your life experience, see if this inner family concept is
believable and credible ...
Pause for a moment, and think of the spectrum of clients you've served. Now
think of the array of colleagues you've worked with, over time. Were some
"easier to work with" than others? Take a moment and articulate
the traits of "an ideal client / patient / student / case". In
round numbers, what percent of those you serve have most of those traits?
Less than half? One out of five? How does working with "less than
ideal" people affect your professional effectiveness, morale, and
satisfaction?
What if you had a way to work "better" with less-than-ideal and
"troublesome" people?
Premises
Based on 62 years in the world, 20 years as a student, researcher, and
practicing relationship therapist, and 15 years' recovery from major
false-self dominance (splitting), I propose that ...
-
( ) ... unless you've
been in self-motivated recovery for some
time, as a professional human-service provider you have an
above-average chance of being unconsciously split - i.e. dominated
by a false self - in high-stress or average work, social, and intimate
situations. To investigate this, use these Lesson 1 resources;
-
( )
If you are
significantly split, the subselves who dominate your personality will
evoke certain patterns of behaviors in the people you work with. For
instance, if your inner family is dominated by a protective
subself, some others will unconsciously tend
to put their needs ahead of yours. If your dominant parts are
egotistical and judgmental of other people, other people (their inner
families)
will probably be moderately to highly guarded, alert, and defensive
around you - and/or resent, avoid, and badmouth you to
others.
-
( ) ... most or all
of the troubled clients, students, patients, or cases you serve are
significantly dominated by false selves, and don't know it. You
(i.e. your inner family) reacts in un/conscious ways to their dominant
subselves, as they do to yours;
-
( ) ... you may
experience some "volatile" clients over time as several
different people, depending on their or your joint situation. Your
client Janice may be reasonable, respectful, and cooperative
at times, and unreasonable, hostile, defensive, bull
headed, and unrealistic at others. The effectiveness of your
professional services is largely shaped by how your inner- family's
leader/s react to each client's dominant personality parts - i.e.
their false self;
-
( ) ... when
your true Self encounters a client or a colleague whose inner family is
well-led by their true Self, both of you know it intuitively - and
you "communicate and work well together";
-
( ) you (your
true Self) can raise the long-term effectiveness of your service to
significantly-split clients by consciously treating their different
dominant subselves as you would separate people. If you treat "all
people exactly the same", then the rest of this article probably
won't be very useful.
Notice your self-talk now. Where does
your mind want to focus, and what are you feeling? What does that mean?
Two
Themes ...
Let's look at two decisions you have. First, you can choose to learn
who comprises your inner family, who normally leads it, and who
activates around "difficult" or split clients? One way of
doing this, overt time, is to experiment with your version of "parts
work". If you're controlled by a protective false self, your
thoughts and reactions to this suggestion may be to discount, over-analyze,
postpone, and/or avoid exploring it.
If your
subself is controlling you, you'll have thoughts like "Too busy. No
time." Your dominant
will guard you with
thoughts like "Nah - stupid psychobabble. Another wild-eyed New Age
idea. Forget it." Your Self might say "Well, I don't know...
We sure have a lot to do already. This is a different way of looking at
things. Might be useful or not. Let's keep an open mind, make a little time,
and learn some more about this "inner family - false self idea before
deciding to act on it or not."
Secondly, you can group
your recent clients by your
stress level in working with them - e.g. low - moderate - high. Then
learn (1) what specific traits in them cause your moderate or high stress,
and (2) how your inner-family members and leader/s typically react to
those traits. Then (3) intentionally build an inner family strategy
for reacting to each "kind" of difficult client, to promote the
most effective service outcome, long term. The underlying presumption is
that you can intentionally flex somewhat to behave differently with
certain clients - without losing your identity and integrity.
I suspect you have two kinds of
"difficult" (moderate to high stress-producing) clients, students,
or cases:
1) those with key
irritating or frustrating traits, like indecisiveness / over guilty /
arrogant / over-angry / self-absorbed / needy-whiney / over-emotional /
...; and ...
2) those who often shift between being "several people"
with you, so you feel "I never know who I'm dealing with". We'll
call those folks chameleons.
You (your true Self) can tailor the inner-family concept to help you work
more effectively with each situation. "More effectively" means (1)
you and your client each get more of your current primary needs met, (2) in a way that feels
good enough to you both.
Working
With Difficult Clients - Options
Here, a "difficult client / patient / student / case" is some
person or group who
frequently raises your personal "stress" - i.e. evokes excessive
frustration, anxiety or fear, guilt, confusion, boredom, lust, sadness,
anger, and/or
pity. You determine what excessive is. Note, incidentally, that
"human nature" decrees that working with such people will reflexively
raise your E(motion) level. That usually unconsciously
impairs your abilities to maintain focus, keep a mutual
and hear the other person/s empathically.
As all service-providers must, you've evolved a strategy to deal with clients
who evoke these feelings in you. Your strategy is probably "by
default" and semi-conscious, vs. consciously designed. Can
you describe it now? What are the key goals of your
"difficult-client" strategy? I'll guess at a couple ...
-
Preserve my own integrity
- act on my main values, despite doubts and anxieties at times. This includes asserting
and enforcing clear boundaries with myself and with them on what I will and
won't do with or for them, how, and when; and ...
-
Do my best to respect my
client's human dignity, even if I don't agree with, respect, or
"like" some of their values, decisions, or behaviors; and ...
-
Act professionally and
ethically in my relationship with them, and on their behalf, as
judged by me, my client, and other involved professionals.
Whether true or not, here are some more options ...
[ ] 1) Unconsciously
or consciously, allow your difficult client to "upset you" - i.e.
allow your false self to activate, and infuse ("blend
with") your Self with a collage of anxieties, irritations, cynicism,
impatience, frustration, numbing, and so on. One common reflex from this is to
feeling resentful and blameful ("1-up") to some degree. Your behavior
will unconsciously reflect that in small or obvious ways - which may well
increase your client's "difficult" responses. Harmonizing
your inner family, and developing your process
awareness skills, over time, can help avoid that.
[ ] 2) In your
client's presence, focus mainly on
while pretending to attend to hers or his. Your client's inner family will sense
this, and react
Options for Working With "Chameleon" Clients
Reflect for a moment on recent clients. Do any come to mind who seem to vary
significantly in "mood", focus, or motives, within a session, and/or
between sessions?
