Why nagging doesn't work: the over-functioning/under-functioning model

Hands up who has repeatedly complained about the same thing to their partner/children?
Potentially over many years?

Yes, my hand is up too. I think we've all tried to change others by complaining which eventually turns into nagging (nagging is complaining even though you already know that it is pointless).

One reason we continue nagging is because we (mistakenly) think it gives us the moral high ground "I'm the good guy, you're the bad guy who still doesn't... never does... always does..." (fill in the blanks).

What it really does is making us unbearable.

So what can we do to change a recurrent situation? A lot actually. And it is linked to the "over-functioning / under-functioning model".

In all family systems, there are areas in which we over-function and others where we under-function. To a point, it is sensible division of labour, everyone does what they're best at. Until of course that sharing of the tasks is considered inequitable by one or both parties. We then tend to think that the situation will improve, if only the under-functioning person were to step up - cue to nagging them.

Now here comes the great revelation: the situation will actually only change if the over-functioning one steps down!
Yes, as long as you do it all - and so very well - and just complain about it, nothing will change.

In effect, you need to stop doing everything so perfectly, in order to give the other the opportunity to step up to the plate. It might feel counter-intuitive, but it works.

In my case, my partner has vastly higher expectations in the tidiness department. As long as he keeps it up, I don't see any opportunity to tidy up - everything is already very neat. Now if he were to let a slide for a bit, in effect if he stopped over-functioning, then I might see some mess, which would bother me after a while, and I would clean it up. I mean I do wash up what's in the sink, but sometimes it needs to be there for a day (or two) - something that never happens if he is around.

The same applies to children: if you keep telling them to clean their rooms, but then you tidy them yourself, guess why the nagging doesn't work...

Maybe that will be my new year's resolution: to stop nagging, to step down where I want help, to leave space for the other to step up. In return, if my partner reads my post (he doesn't always, I wonder why lol), I may just be given the opportunity to clean my act up - literally :)

So what is it that you always complain about to your partner?
Could you possibly be over-functioning? Might you possibly be setting the bar impossibly high?
How does "doing less" sound as a new year's resolution - less over-functioning, and hence less nagging?

Change what you can change: yourself

When I suggest to a client that they may want to change something about themselves in order to change their situation, it sometimes gets misunderstood as "I need to change because I'm not ok".

Far from it, as I do think my clients are ok. And I often do think that their environment is not. 

So why do I insist change has to start with them?

Why would I suggest an abused spouse leave rather than try and change their partner?

Why would I suggest that an unhappy spouse work on him/herself?

Simply because we cannot change others. Believe me, my clients have tried, often for many years. They have tried everything to change someone else: nagging, begging, sometimes even violence. Nothing works, because somehow their relationship has reached an equilibrium in its dysfunction.

BUT, and this is the good news, when we do change our own input into a relationship, family system or workplace, the output will change too. 

Look at it as win-win: you change the bits that don't work for you, and in exchange your relationship either improves or you make space for a new, better relationship, with the new you. 

So it's not as much changing who you are, but changing what doesn't work for you.

You have nothing to lose. 

Are you game to try? 

Say for one week? 

To change one little behaviour that you think may be undermining your happiness?

I'd love to hear how you go...

Botox and repression of emotions "work" in the same way

Here, I'll admit to it, I had Botox injections. And at the beginning I was thrilled: that deep furrow between my brows, that made me look worried/angry all the time, was gone! No more "resting bitch face" for me, thank you very much.

Then I thought, those little lines that bunch together every time I squint, maybe I could get rid of them too? "Oh yes", said the lovely doctor whose whole face did not move at all, "that's easy and requires very little, and the results are always excellent". Of course that's all that was needed to convince me.

After the treatment, I started noticing that those little lines at the inside corner of my eyes had indeed disappeared; but instead, little lines at the outside of my eyes had appeared! Basically, my eyes still wanted to squint, and they just found other - non-immobilised - muscles to do it, leaving me with wrinkles elsewhere.

Repression or denial of emotions works exactly the same way. You can make them go away for a short time. You can chase/drink/fuck/gamble away those messy feelings or memories.

But before you know it, they pop up elsewhere; they may have changed shape - from fear to anxiety to panic - or changed their expression. But in the same way as putting a blanket over a sleeping dog does not make the dog disappear, repressing or denying your feelings won't make their cause disappear.

Sometimes you have to accept that there is a mess, be it emotional or facial, and use the awareness to gently introduce change. In my Botox case, the change will be to aim for graceful ageing rather than fake youth.

What are you trying so hard to hide that it has no choice than to pop up elsewhere?

What if you took it out, and looked at it just for a brief moment?

Maybe you'll find out that whatever you are repressing is actually less scary in the daylight of your awareness than in the darkness of your subconscious...


If you liked this article, you may also like this one on why we need to feel our emotions, even or especially the "negative" ones.

Happiness or meaningfulness - the choice is yours

Today's world bombards you with the message that you have the right to be happy, or worse, that you "have to be" happy. Because if you aren't, clearly you are doing something wrong.

The advertising industry then very helpfully proceeds to tell you what exactly you need to be happy.

Want a holiday? Fly off to Fiji and relax on the beach - boom, you're happy.
Want the latest gadget? Queue up at the (Apple) store, get your hands on the oh-so desired object - and feel the warm glow of satisfaction.

Or, if you have less consumerist aspirations, want a cold beer whilst sitting somewhere with a view? Here it is - enjoy it (responsibly)!

Now what is this elusive happiness, that we're all chasing? One definition - the one used by our consumerist society - is that happiness is the satisfaction of our wants. And who hasn't thought "as soon as I get this (insert as needed: holiday, house, girlfriend, gadget, break, sleep) I'll be happy"?
So happiness seems to be all about "getting something".

What happens though, the moment we get used to the new designer couch, boyfriend, gadget? Or when we have to come home from the holiday, go back to work after the weekend? Our happiness plummets again, and we start chasing or waiting for the next "thing".

Happiness is a fickle mistress, always needing to be entertained with more exotic trinkets...

And the reality is that life also comes with suffering, grief, death. Happiness can't help us deal with those. We cannot "shop away" pain. And drinking it away isn't a solution either.

So what else is there?
In some ways, meaningfulness is the opposite of happiness. The meaningful things in our life mostly imply working our butt off, sleepless nights, heartache, suffering...

The few people I know personally who are truly living meaningful lives (and who I would think of as happy people, in the non-advertising definition of happiness) all have one thing in common:
their boundless love, their limitless giving of what they have.

It is when we give to others that we find meaning.

Here is a little list of some of the "things" that give my life meaning (in no particular order):

My work. I get rather less of the normal perks of work (like money), yet by being there for others, by listening to their stories, by holding them in their pain, my life serves a purpose.

My partner and my friends.

My children. They definitely don't make my life "happy" in the above sense (only on the odd occasion) as so many of my wants had to take the backseat (peace and quiet, to name just two). It's a hard job to transform two egocentric little puppies into altruistic human beings. But loving them, as unconditionally as I am capable of, gives my life meaning. 

Looking after my father. Although I can only do that a few weeks here and there (my mother is the main carer and I am immensely grateful to her), and as hard and heart-breaking as it is, it allows me to reflect on all he has done for me, selflessly, all the love he gave me, all the time, all the wisdom he passed on. And it makes his life meaningful as well, for him to see in me the fruit of his hard work.

Some charities I support, where I can see firsthand the difference they make to people, animals or the environment (my favourite ones being the Fred Hollows Foundation, which works all around the world to restore sight to the blind, and the Hamlin Fistula Ethiopia Hospital, which operates on women maimed by childbirth, to give them back a normal life instead of one of immense suffering and shame. Both are gifts that keep on giving, the sufferer can lead a normal life, which in turn frees up his or her carer, and both can then contribute to their communities).

Meaning is about leaving the world a better place after your passage on earth. So we don't just live and die, like a blip on the radar. It is about legacy, about being remembered, not necessarily by name, but for what we have done.

To me it is about alleviating suffering, and when that is not possible, just being with the person in their pain, so they are not alone.

I sometimes joke that my work motto is "I'm changing the world, one person at a time"; yet deep down, that is what I hope - that I will leave the world a better place, through the love and time I give to others.

This post has been inspired by this article in The Atlantic about Victor Frankl, my psychotherapist hero.