Scripts People Live

by Claude Steiner

  Eventually, they worked the problem out by a mutual giving up of privilege. They agreed to the following: He would work on his difficulty with giving strokes to her if she worked on her jealousy about his giving strokes to other people, including other women. He became willing to give up his unequal share of her strokes, and she became willing to give up her unequal share of his.

  3. No power plays. The effective establishment of a cooperative relationship is also based on the agreement that power plays are not an option under any circumstances. Power plays are based on the assumption of scarcity and competitiveness and are the antithesis of cooperative behavior and must be given up as a method of getting what one wants in a cooperative relationship.

  This point seems simple at first, but it turns out to be one of the most difficult cooperative agreements to honor. We are deeply immersed in fears of scarcity and thoroughly trained to use power of one sort or another to get what we want. Threats, sulking, yelling, banging doors, discounting, and so on are more accessible to us as approaches to what we want than discussion and negotiation. Both partners need to be on the lookout for power plays and willing to call, and be called, on them and stop as soon as they happen.

  4. No secrets. If cooperation is to exist, there must be no secrets kept, especially about what one wants. Thus, everyone in the situation must ask for everything they want 100% of the time.1 The tendency to use power plays to get what one wants is coupled with the inability to know or ask for what one wants clearly and openly. The reason for this is that in a competitive situation to reveal what one’s needs are is to warn one’s competitor of where the demand is going to be so that fears of scarcity for the supply will be aroused. As a consequence, people in a competitive, individualist situation are thoroughly trained and indoctrinated into not saying what their wants are, and for good reason, since to express one’s needs will immediately decrease the supply of what is needed and create further scarcity of it. However, in a cooperative situation, to ask for what one needs is a basic requirement for satisfaction. Given a context of willingness to struggle against competitiveness, to say what one wants is the first step to getting it. It will immediately enlist the interest and energy of the others to provide satisfaction of those wants. In the work to achieve cooperation one of the biggest problems is that people either will not say what they want or are not actually in touch with it and eventually become resentful because they don’t get it.

  Paradoxical as it may seem, to ask for everything that one wants 100% of the time seems an individualist and competitive move, yet it is an essential aspect of the struggle against competitiveness and individualism. One only needs to understand that to ask for what one wants 100% of the time is not the same as to grab, to outfox, to cajole people out of what they want; it is simply stating one’s position, a position with which everyone who has stated theirs can cooperate and negotiate.

  I do not mean to imply that in a cooperative situation everyone will get what she or he wants immediately. However, the process by which what one wants is modified by what others want in a cooperative situation is amazing, an almost magical event, so that, often, when it doesn’t seem possible that there will be enough for everyone it turns out that there is. It appears that people’s drive toward cooperation is as strong as their drive for food, for shelter, for strokes; so that one’s need for food, for shelter, or strokes can be very strongly modified by one’s need to cooperate. The pleasure in supplying for others what they need, which is a function of the Nurturing Parent, the source of the cooperative instinct, in many cases overrides the needs for sex, food, and other material goods. Felt needs for items which are in short supply actually decrease in the presence of others with whom one can cooperate by sharing, while the artificial consumer needs created by merchandising and advertising are dramatically diminished.

  The effect of cooperation on consumer needs becomes most visible in larger groups. This country is made up essentially of pairs of people and their children living under separate roofs with one refrigerator, one stove, one washer, one or two cars, etc. Eight people and their children could live equally well, provided they were able to cooperate, with the same refrigerator, stove, washer, and perhaps three cars. Further, the decrease in competitiveness would diminish their need to “keep up with the Joneses.” Finally, strokes would be in less scarcity, so that consumer needs which are based on stroke hunger (cosmetics, drugs, new clothing, automobiles, and so on) would be sharply diminished.

  In the event that in the cooperative process a person does not get what she wants, it is part of the agreement that she continue to ask for what is needed as often as possible and that she make clear that she is satisfied. Her dissatisfaction, if not expressed, will be accumulated in the form of resentment which can build into the tendency to become angry and resentful and, once again, individualist, competitive and grasping. Generally, a person who does not get what he wants, a person who is in need of something, is scripted in a competitive society to blame himself for his unfulfilled needs. As an example, poor people blame themselves for their poverty, with ample help from the rich. They attribute it to lack of drive, lack of will power, etc. People who are hungry often feel ashamed of the fact. People who are sexually in need find it hard to admit to it. It is extremely important that the self-blame, the taking onto oneself the cause of one’s oppression, be fought by not going along with the feelings of shame and worthlessness and asking for what one wants. A cooperative society is based on the assumption that everyone is O.K., everyone wants to contribute, and everyone deserves enough of everything she or he needs.

  5. No Rescues. A fifth requirement for an effective cooperative situation is that there be No Rescues. While people are supposed to ask for 100% of what they want, it is also important that if they do not ask others to provide for their needs, others do not act out of shame or guilt or misguided nurturing without having a clear sign that the need exists. In this particular situation, a Rescue would be to do things or go along with situations which one does not want because one suspects that the other person, now seen as Victim, powerless to fend for himself, wants them. This is a Rescue which violates the contract to ask for what one wants, for both the Rescuer and the Victim. It also re-creates the situation in which power plays to arouse guilt and shame can be used to get what one wants instead of asking for it.

  On the other hand, it is also important that in a cooperative situation people do not persecute each other through anti-Rescue, which is an exaggerated disregard of what one guesses other people want. Anti-Rescue, which is a kind of hardening of one’s perceptions of other people’s needs for the purpose of not Rescuing, is Persecutory. For example, in one couple, the woman decided to stop Rescuing her husband’s needs for nurturing, which she had routinely satisfied without his requests or thanks. She stopped guessing what he needed and took a hard anti-Rescue stance which frightened and angered him. This was an incomplete solution; in group, she worked out a non-Persecutory, non-Rescuing stance in which she would still be aware of his needs and make this awareness clear to him, but refused to nurture him unless he asked for and actively appreciated her nurturing. She also made a trade agreement for nurturing from him, when she needed it. This was not a Rescue because she did not do anything he didn’t ask for, but it also defeated the tendency to Persecute because it offered a vehicle for the satisfaction of his needs.

  No matter how smoothly a cooperative struggle goes, it often happens that one person is reluctant or unwilling to cooperate at one time or another. The proper response in this temporary non-cooperation is to be quite explicit about one’s feelings of disappointment. The withdrawal of sharing, as a response to a clearly uncooperative move on someone else’s part, is a legitimate maneuver in a cooperative struggle. This is especially clear in situations with children, who often either overtly refuse to cooperate or give up completely in their cooperative efforts. In this case it’s legitimate to act in a manner which withdraws one’s own willingness to cooperate and sha
re. This is not a power play because it is an honest, above-board, and overt maneuver based on one’s feelings. One simply loses interest in cooperating in the presence of uncooperative people. Therefore, once again, based on the rule that one should say what one wants all the time, it is a legitimate approach.

  For example, in a cooperative household involving children, the expectation is that they contribute their efforts. Chores, being helpful, anticipating people’s needs, not disrupting, entertaining, and taking care of themselves, all are ways in which children can cooperate. Children who contribute their energy to the household are appreciated and liked. One wants to do things for them, spend time with them.

  When children refuse to cooperate, the opposite reaction occurs. One dislikes them, one does not want to do anything for them. In one household the parents stopped being helpful in many small ways to a ten-year-old who was not cooperative. They stopped making special treats, taking her to her friends, inviting her to movies, cooking minor meals like breakfast or snacks. This was done without vindictiveness or anger, but simply because it no longer felt right in light of the girl’s behavior. Cooperation was the child’s renewed choice soon after she saw the loss incurred due to her lack of cooperation.

  Two, Three, or More

  The struggle for cooperative behavior, which as I said before is most easily engaged in within a couple, can be expanded to a couple and children, or to three, four, five, or more people. In every case it requires that the above agreements be respected; and while the struggle between people who are not couples is often not as committed and has less cohesiveness to carry it through difficult spots, it is also quite possible and desirable. Clearly, the difficulties multiply the more people there are involved, and the two-person situation seems an almost indispensable first step. It appears to me that in a gradual process where one moves from competitiveness to cooperation, from acting alone to acting in groups, the first step is cooperation between two people in which the struggle is most easily pursued and moving from there to larger groups of people.

  26

  Child-Rearing for

  Autonomy

  Looking at the script matrix, one can put oneself in the position of the offspring or the parents. Transactional script analysis deals mostly with the difficulties that people experience as offspring, but an inescapable question in relation to scripts is, “As a parent, how can I bring up my children in the best possible way, given these ideas?”

  How much should children be taught? How much should they be disciplined? How much should they be left alone? How much should they be told or not told? Injunctions are made to sound harmful, but isn’t it necessary to enjoin children from certain behavior harmful or to their disadvantage? How do we make certain that our feelings about our children aren’t unwitting programs for them to follow against their own better judgment? How do we raise children to have a maximum amount of autonomy without taking the risk that they will be neglected, without self-discipline, goals, values, or ideals? How do we raise libertarians without raising libertines?

  Once again, the solution is based on faith in human nature; the firm belief that people, including children, are O.K. and, if given a chance, will do O.K. As a consequence, if one follows this point logically, bringing up children is a matter of allowing them to discover what it is they want and not interfering with their spontaneity, their awareness, and their intimacy.

  Children will do what is right for them, given the freedom to choose and circumstances in which the choices can be made without stress or pressure. Power plays are not necessary to cause or help children to do what is good for them; they will do it on their own accord.

  Take, for instance, the example of an eight-year-old who on a weekday wants to stay up late to watch television. Parents know that a child needs about ten hours of sleep to be able to function adequately, and most parents would be inclined to set a bedtime and insist that it be kept. Suppose now that Mary, who has to get up at seven o’clock in the morning, wants to stay up beyond nine o’clock in the evening. What are her parents’ choices in this matter? Should they enforce a nine o’clock bedtime by insisting on it and using power tactics such as withdrawing strokes, commands, yelling, turning off the television, spanking, or maybe even forcibly undressing the child and putting her to bed if necessary? To be sure, most children wouldn’t rebel against a nine o’clock bedtime to the point where they’d have to be forced into bed. However, some sort of resistance, we assume, will be encountered from Mary who wants to stay up beyond nine o’clock. The parents in this situation are up against their own faith in human nature. If we assume that Mary is an intelligent human being capable of making valid decisions in the affairs that concern her, I as a parent would like her to exercise this capacity and trust her to choose well. As far as I’m concerned, Mary has the right to stay up as late as she wants, to get as little sleep as she will, and to be cranky all the next day if she so chooses.

  You may ask, “What if she oversleeps and misses her bus and therefore has to either be driven to school or put in a cab or even stay at home the next day?” Mary’s selfishness of the night before might result in her missing school or creating a large inconvenience for her parents the morning after.

  This is a good question; and the answer is that autonomy does not include the freedom to cause inconvenience or pain to others. So long as a certain action affects the person alone, cooperative child-rearing for autonomy demands that the person be given the choice and be allowed to make it. If the choices made result in some harm or inconvenience to other people, then the people inconvenienced have a right to demand that that kind of a choice not be made again. If Mary stays up and oversleeps, misses the school bus, and has to be driven to school, then —but only then—can the parents begin to make certain demands with respect to her bedtime.

  Suppose that Mary stayed up and overslept. Now she wants to stay up late once again. The parents notice this and ask her to go to bed.

  “Mary, I would like you to go to bed. It’s past nine o’clock.”

  “But I want to watch this program, and it ends at eleven o’clock.”

  “I don’t think that’s a good idea, Mary, because last time you stayed up you overslept, and I had to drive you to school.”

  “I won’t oversleep this time. I’ll set the alarm.”

  Mother could now power play Mary and force her to go to bed, or she could once again give Mary a choice; but this time with some reasonable, cooperatively arrived at conditions.

  “O.K., Mary. I don’t think it’s a good idea. I think you’re going to have trouble getting up. But I think you should do what you think is best for you. However, I’m not going to get up to wake you tomorrow morning or drive you to school; and if you oversleep I would like you to pay for the cab out of your allowance, or walk to school, no matter how late. Do you agree?”

  “O.K., Mom. Can I pay for the cab by doing the dishes?”

  “Fine. Enjoy your program.”

  Chances are that Mary will wake up and go to school in time. If she doesn’t and has to walk to school, she will probably choose not to watch television next time rather than take a chance on being too sleepy in the morning.

  The above example shows how it is possible to allow Mary to choose what she wants to do, to allow her to experience the consequences of her choice, without, at the same time, allowing her to interfere with other people’s well-being. When Mary is given this kind of freedom in a host of situations beginning as soon as she is able to make such choices, she will grow accustomed to making decisions which are based on her own judgment. Her judgment will include her responsibilities toward others. Children who are obedient and follow orders become accustomed to doing things as they are told without understanding why and without autonomy. Children raised under this kind of program are mysteriously expected, once they are emancipated, to suddenly be able to make decisions and choices on their own. The fact is that most children’s upbringing gives them no opportunity to choose, gives them
no opportunity to experience the consequences of their choices, and gives them no opportunity to make cooperative choices which respect the rights of other human beings.

  But suppose now that the reason why Mary stays up late at night has something to do with the fact that she really doesn’t want to go to school and that she would rather watch television than ready herself for school the next morning. She may even secretly hope that if she stays up late she will oversleep and not have to go to school. What are parents to do—since at this point Mary would not only welcome oversleeping but would also welcome missing the bus and perhaps even not being driven to school? This is a more complicated situation. What are parents to do about the fact that some children don’t like to go to school and that they’ll do anything to avoid it? I want to answer this question with another question. What interests you more: freedom, or school attendance? Do you want to bring up children to do things they don’t enjoy, and which are not likely to be good for them? If a child does not enjoy school, chances are that the school is not a good place for the child. Once again, faith in human nature demands that we assume that children will be interested in learning when learning is interesting, that children want to go to school when school is a good place for them. It stands to reason that if school is a nasty, uptight, competitive place filled with social and racial strife, authoritarianism, and injunctions against spontaneity, awareness, and intimacy, children might want to stay away from it. But the law says children have to go to school. So what are parents to do?

  Clearly, the problem now proliferates. Parents who want to raise children who are free and not bound by oppressive and defeating scripts may have a great deal more to do than to follow certain simple cooperative formulas at home. It is not conducive to autonomy to force a child to go to a bad school no matter how cooperative the home situation. As a consequence, parents may have to choose between not sending children to the school (which means sending them to a better school which they may not be able to afford, or keeping them out of school altogether), or putting demands on the school, organizing, and becoming social activists in behalf of their children so that school becomes a better place and the child may want to go to it.