Beth, a client of mine a number of years ago, got a very bitter taste of life’s unfairness. She grew up in a family where her older brother was favored, subtly and not so subtly, by her parents. They bought him a car in high school, paid his way through an expensive Eastern college, and then helped him get through law school. For Beth, the family car and a nearby state college were good enough, and there was no money for graduate education. “My father said they had only so much money and I’d just get married anyway,” she commented.
“I went along with all that until my midtwenties,” she explained. “Then suddenly it all hit me like a lightning bolt, and I was livid. It wasn’t fair. I needed my own car just as badly as he did. I was just as smart, even smarter probably, and could have done graduate work. Yet just because he was firstborn and a son to boot, he got preferential treatment. That stinks!”
Unfairness is a hard thing to accept. We have an internal code of right and wrong imprinted on our souls, and unfairness violates that code. The issue here isn’t, “Is life going to be unfair?” Of course, it is. The real issue is, “How are you going to handle unfairness when it comes your way?” Allow me to offer a few suggestions.
First, you need to call things what they are, so the starting point in dealing with unfairness is to call it unfairness. That may seem obvious, but far too often we make excuses for others, we act as though what they did wasn’t unfair, or we call unfairness by some other name just to smooth things over or keep the peace.
Second, you must allow yourself to feel hurt and angry when something unfair happens. Notice I said hurt and angry. I didn’t say bitter, resentful, and enraged. There is a big difference. It is appropriate to feel hurt and angry when something unfair happens, so let yourself feel these emotions.
Third, you need to decide whether you want to assert yourself and try to correct the unfairness. Some things are worth speaking up about (they overcharge you for repairing your car just because you are a woman), whereas other things are not (someone gets a few more french fries in an order than you did). There is a time to stand up and say, “I am not going to take this!” and a time to say, “No big deal, I’m gonna let this one slide.”
Fourth, you need to work on not taking what happened personally (something we will discuss in a future chapter). Whether someone intentionally or unintentionally acted unfairly, what happened wasn’t a personal statement about you. Some of us are so personally insulted when something unfair comes our way, we grossly overreact. Though easier said than done, we must realize that unfairness toward us is about the other person who acted unfairly, not about us.
Finally, and most difficult of all, you need to forgive. Forgiving others for being unfair doesn’t mean forgetting what they did, nor does it mean saying that what they did was okay. It also doesn’t mean that you let them keep doing it to you. Forgiveness is an act of your will where you decide to wipe the slate clean and make a conscious commitment not to hold what the people did to you against them. It means letting go of the past so that you can live more fully in the here and now. It means letting something truly be “water under the bridge.”
Beth had to work on every one of these issues in counseling except the first one. She clearly had come to see that the preferential treatment her parents showed her brother was unfair. Here is how one of our sessions went when we worked on the issue of forgiving her parents and letting what they did be “water under the bridge”:
“Beth, what happened to you was certainly unfair. And I can understand why you feel hurt and angry about it,” I offered. “What concerns me about all this is how you are allowing the past to ruin your life today.”
“What do you mean?” she said.
“You’re allowing something that happened twenty years ago to wreck your life right now, aren’t you?”
“Well, I guess . . . ,” she hesitated. “Should I just sweep it under the carpet as if it didn’t happen?”
“I think you know that doesn’t work,” I said, “but it’s how you keep it alive that is ruining you.”
Beth thought about that for a second, gazing out the window, then responded, “You’re saying that I keep reliving what happened in a way that only makes me more resentful, right?”
“Right,” I said. “It seems to me that you think something like this shouldn’t have happened to you, so you are going to make your parents pay by staying miserable over it. You keep playing the role of the victimized daughter who can’t move on with her life because of what was done to you years ago. The family martyr, maybe.”
Tears filled her eyes, and I wondered if they were from realizing the truth of what I was saying or if I had been too rough. After what seemed like an hour, Beth landed on the right side of the fence.
“It isn’t easy to admit this, but I have been feeling this way for a long, long time. I haven’t moved one inch in the direction of accepting what happened and forgiving my parents for it. Every time I hear about how well my brother is doing, I become even more resentful. I have been mired in this for a long time,” she sobbed.
“It sounds like you are in quicksand—the more you struggle against what your parents did, the more you sink into bitterness,” I observed.
“That’s sure how it feels. I guess if I am ever going to get out alive, I have to let go and forgive.”
Beth worked hard to step out of the victim’s role over what her parents had done to her. She came to see more deeply that it was unfair, that it had nothing to do with her, that she was just as deserving of the help that her brother got, and that it was time to forgive her parents for what they did. All of this was hard work, but Beth saw that it was even harder to play the role of the bitter, shortchanged daughter. Much to her credit, she moved out from under the shadow cast by the unfair way she was raised and broke free from the resentment she had harbored for years. She got her life back.
None of us will escape life’s unfairness. It is delusional to think that we will. We can make some choices, though. We can choose to victimize ourselves over what others do to us that isn’t fair. We can return evil for evil and do something unfair to them. Or we can accept what happened, hurt over it, and forgive it. It’s up to us to handle unfairness so as not to pay twice for it—once when it happened and once again when we allow it to wreck our lives.
“You Shouldn’t Have to Wait for What You Want.”
Elaine loves clothes. She always looks as if she stepped off the cover of Vogue when she comes to see me. But that love is the very reason she seeks counseling. Elaine, a spendaholic, is deeply in debt. She seems unable to stop herself from buying everything she sees.
“I did it again,” she said. “I bought a dress I didn’t need. I just couldn’t resist. It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.”
“You felt you couldn’t live without it,” I ventured.
“Right. Even though it cost four hundred dollars, I had to have it.”
“Didn’t you tell me last session that you had charged your credit cards to the limit?” I asked.
“Yes, but one bank increased my limit,” she said sheepishly.
“How do you feel about what you’ve done?” I asked.
“Guilty. I know I shouldn’t have bought the dress. At the same time, getting the dress sure felt good.”
Earlier, we talked about the “you can have it all” lie. The “don’t wait” lie is a variation on the same theme; its falsehood stems from the same impulse. You can have it all, so why wait? Why not have as much of it as you can right this very second? Whip out that credit card; shortcut that degree; don’t hold back on the impulse to tell off that person who offended you.
Most of us know the lure of instant gratification in small daily ways. We really shouldn’t have those greasy, calorie-laden french fries with the hamburger, but what the heck? We only live once. We’ll start that diet tomorrow. Why wait?
I find out pretty quickly which of my patients live by this “don’t wait” lie. Many come for help thinking that psy
chologists have magic words that will instantly make their lives free from pain. Once they see that therapy is going to be laborious, difficult work, some don’t come back. These patients come to therapy to be immediately changed by the psychologist, not to change themselves over time with hard work.
Waiting is a lost art in our country today. Far too many consumers aren’t waiting until they actually have the money before they buy something, far too many couples aren’t waiting to give their relationship time to grow, far too many teenagers aren’t waiting until marriage to have sex, far too many people don’t wait until someone is finished speaking before they start saying their piece, and far too many drivers don’t wait to merge. It is an “I shouldn’t have to wait” culture, and credit card debt, divorce, unwanted pregnancies, rudeness, and highway deaths are just part of the price tag.
What about you? Are you willing to wait?
“People Are Basically Good.”
Amy, an attractive twenty-five-year-old computer programmer, has been seeing me lately to try to sort out the reasons for her series of bad relationships with men. She is a bright, articulate, and responsible woman whose life is mostly in good shape, except for one area. Every relationship she has had with a man since she was a teenager has been chaotic and painful.
“I just don’t know what keeps causing my relationships to go bad,” she said one day. “I end up feeling used and hurt every time.”
“When you date a man, what assumptions do you make about his intentions?” I asked her.
She looked a bit startled. “Assumptions? Well, I don’t know. I guess I assume he’s like me.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“I assume his intentions are that he wants to get to know me for me and see if a relationship can develop.”
“Honorable intentions, then?” I said.
“Yes, honorable, I guess.”
“Specifically, how do you see them being honorable?” I asked.
She smiled, a bit chagrined. “You know what I mean. That the guy is moral. That sex isn’t the only thing on his mind. That he likes my company.”
“And what have you discovered?” I asked.
She grimaced. “That a lot of men are out for themselves. They don’t care who they hurt.”
While Amy’s troubles with men are caused by a number of factors, one of the more important is her underlying assumption that men, and people in general, are basically good. She entered dating relationships thinking that each guy was well-intentioned, really cared about her, and wanted only her best. She found out that just the opposite was more likely to be true.
Now, this may be the point where you are tempted to put this book down permanently. One of our more treasured notions is that people are basically good (loving, kind, decent, fair, caring, honest). Well, at the risk of triggering a fit, I want to tell you in no uncertain terms that people are not basically good! People are basically selfish, self-centered, dishonest, and deceitful.
I may be one of the few psychologists in the world who thinks this way, but that is how I think. In an age when human potential and self-actualization are buzzwords and when best-selling books include Personal Power and Awaken the Giant Within, the idea that our nature is seriously flawed tends to bother us because it forces us to give up cherished notions about our goodness. Many of us prefer to accept more “positive” views of human nature. For example, here is the view held by noted humanistic psychologist Abraham Maslow:
This inner nature, as much as we know of it so far, seems not to be intrinsically or primarily or necessarily evil [but rather] neutral . . . or positively “good.” . . . Since this inner nature is good or neutral rather than bad, it is best to bring it out and to encourage it rather than to suppress it. If it is permitted to guide our life, we grow healthy, fruitful, and happy.8
This view of human nature certainly makes us feel better, but is it true? I don’t think so, and I can point to two main pieces of evidence.
First, the history of mankind is characterized by man treating his fellowman badly. Human history is marked by war, greed, jealousy, envy, hatred, and murder, not helping out one another, not getting along peacefully, and not loving one another. How we humans have treated one another throughout recorded history is irrefutable evidence that people are not basically good. If people were basically good, we would have seen much more peaceful, loving coexistence among us than there has been.
Second, people in their personal lives are more selfish than selfless, more shallow than deep, more self-destructive than growthful, and more discontented than contented. Look at almost anyone’s life and ask yourself if that person is physically, emotionally, and spiritually healthy. Most people struggle in all three areas of life—physically out of shape, emotionally troubled, and spiritually immature if not dead. If people were basically good, the average person would be physically fit, emotionally stable, and living a moral life. That is not the average person, not by a long shot.
Now that I have depressed you, I want to make it clear, though, that I don’t agree with those who say that people are worthless scum and are no darn good. That is also a lie. However bent toward selfishness and self-destruction we may be, human history and each individual’s personal life provide ample evidence that the spark of the Divine does exist in us and that we are capable of being loving and kind and noble. I am just saying that acting “divinely” is not our nature and that anyone who tells you so is grossly misleading you.
Too many of my patients are casualties of the “people are good” lie. Like Amy’s expectations, their expectations of people are the highest and purest when a healthy skepticism would serve them better.
“Is it wrong to think the best of people?” Amy exclaimed after I suggested that people are not as good as she might think.
“It’s not proving to be true, is it?”
She stopped, a bit startled, then shook her head. “That’s for sure.” She sighed. “But what’s the alternative? Should I assume all guys are pigs and not trust any of them?”
It was my turn to shake my head. “That sounds like going to the other extreme.”
“Yes, I guess so.”
“What would be an honest middle ground?” I asked.
“Well, let me think,” she said, shuffling her feet and looking down at the carpet. “Maybe I should hold off on assuming anything.” She looked back up at me. “I mean, I can’t really know about a guy’s intentions until I check them out.”
“So you wouldn’t think either way?” I said.
She nodded. “I wouldn’t assume they are good or bad. In fact, I wouldn’t assume, period. Maybe I wouldn’t give so much of myself emotionally so quickly, either. Maybe I need to study the guys I date a little more before giving them any of my heart.”
“Well, I agree that you need to study guys more carefully and take time to let them reveal their true intentions. How would that affect your dating life?”
I asked.
“I’d pace my relationships slower. I wouldn’t be so totally naive.” She paused for a second. “I trust too quickly, don’t I,” she said, more of a statement than a question. “They can’t use me unless I let them; I know that. So I should work on patience, on letting the relationship go slowly. Then I will be able to see what a guy is really like and whether I want to be around him.”
Amy did just that. She realized that the evidence didn’t back up her assumptions about men (and people) being basically good. She realized that all people have some good in them that needs to be affirmed but not blindly trusted. She realized that slowing things down in her dating relationships gave her more time to see what was “under the hood” before she made any decisions about becoming involved with anyone. She opened herself up to a lot less emotional pain without making the mistake of shutting herself off from relationships unnecessarily. She quit looking at people through rose-colored glasses and moved toward a more realistic view of who people are.
You may not buy the idea I am suggesting h
ere—that people are not basically good. It may be a notion you just can’t (won’t?) accept. I would ask you to examine this from one final angle before you move on: Are you basically good? Is your natural bent toward kindness, integrity, loyalty, honesty, service, self-sacrifice, growth, maturity, and the like? Or do you find these qualities to be ones that you have to work at triple-time to exhibit on a regular basis? I think if you are honest with yourself, the simple truth of the matter is that these traits don’t come naturally, and we have to work on them if we ever hope to have them. Just raise children and I think you will know what I mean.
In a world that often attributes wrong actions in people to low self-esteem, I wonder if the real problem isn’t that we think too highly of ourselves. We think we are basically good when we are not, and we walk around arrogant and puffed up rather than humble and broken. Pride of this kind goes before our own destruction. We must come to grips with the fact that our inner nature must be killed off, not encouraged as Abraham Maslow suggested earlier. Encouraging our inner nature leads to thorns, not flowers.
Growthwork
Your last assignment involved tracking and assessing the event (“A”) level of the A-B-C model. Now, I want you to jump past “B” and track the “C” level. The “C” level represents our reactions to the events that happen to us. These reactions can take three forms.
First, we often react physiologically to certain events with increased heart rate, muscle tension, and rapid and shallow breathing. This is the fight-or-flight reaction to certain events, such as almost being hit by someone running a red light or being criticized by a boss. Our bodies react with alarm in a way that prepares us physiologically to run away or face the event.
The Lies We Believe Page 6