Why can't everyone be just like you?
Moving Pete in with me and my three kids took a lot of adjustment.
For me.
We went from partying together at weekends, excited to see each other to him watching me cut up an onion asking, ‘Is that meant to be finely chopped?’ My look back at him was a warning. Which he failed to recognise. Because days later he called me over to the kitchen bin and said ‘Let me show you how to put a bin bag in properly.’
My thoughts were:
I’m going to kill you.
Do you think after bringing up 3 kids on my own I need you to show me this crap.
The fact that we need to do domestic stuff is bad enough; I certainly don’t want to engage in any conversation about it.
His thoughts were:
I’ve got a quicker, better way to do this that I want to show Nic. Life lessons.
Isn’t it nice sharing a home doing normal stuff together.
During those heady days I could not understand why he wanted to talk about domestic stuff. I didn’t so why on earth would he want to.
Why wasn’t he just like me?
One of the things that screws with clients’ minds and is a constant source of frustration are those colleagues who don’t think or behave just like them.
I just don’t understand why they don’t keep me updated.’
‘I just don’t understand why they’re always late.’
‘I just don’t understand why they need to go into so much detail.’
‘I just don’t understand why they never get back to me.’
You see you have collected a whole list of rules on how people should behave and think in life. Rules that you live by. Rules that you judge yourself and others by.
But we’re all living our lives guided by a different rule book.
These rules books have been created as a result of your life experiences, things that you’ve been taught by parents, teachers, friends, TV, social media and so much more.
And most of them have served you really well. But at times you carry them as if they are ‘the truth’ to living. When you hold them really tightly, apply them universally, you are setting yourself up for frustration, annoyance, anger and fractured relationships because, we all are living by different rule books because we’ve all experienced life differently.
The problem is that they’re invisible. We can’t look up ‘Jane’s rule book’ to understand how they work, play and interact with other people. And they can’t look up yours either.
And someone breaking your rules isn’t the only problem. It’s the follow up interpretation of their intention behind the crime. When Jane breaks your rule of turning up late you’re right there thinking ‘She’s so disrespectful. She doesn’t value my time, she doesn’t care….’
And it’s so exhausting isn’t it. This feeling of being constantly pissed off with someone.
One small thing that you can do
Next time you get frustrated/angry/annoyed about the behaviour of someone else try this:
Name the emotion. Notice the emotion you are feeling and name it. The aim isn’t to make the emotion to go away but detach from it.
Get curious. Ask yourself ‘What underlying rule of mine is driving my response?’
Hold the rule lightly. Remind yourself that whilst you’d prefer for people to follow the rule they are living by a different rule book and that’s okay.
Understand. Empathise with their situation. What might be the reasons for their behaviour.