Category Archives: Emotional Intelligence

Human Nature Lessons

Human Nature

Above all, people want to believe they are good people and they will do every mental trick in the book to believe it. 

Either they will focus on the intent and say they had good intentions so focus on that, or they will say they had good impact and say focus on that. Rarely will they own up when there is a mismatch in intention and impact and apologize for having bad intentions but good impact or for having good intentions but bad impact.  They will focus on the good so that they can sleep at night thinking that they are good people. 

Stages of Mental Health Deterioration

Emotional Intelligence, Life Advice

A few weeks ago I went through a huge range of mental health, so I want to document that experience here for your benefit so that you can use it as a reference for understanding your own mental health, for understanding the mental health of others, and so you know how to use that understanding to help yourself or others.

 

Stage 1. I felt so bad that I started hallucinating. In the shadows of the night I’d see faces staring back at me when I know there’s nothing there. But because my mental health is weak, then the part of my brain that separates fantasy from reality got blurred.

Stage 2. Then as I regained sanity, I could sense that I was unwell, but I couldn’t tell what was unwell. This is the stage where so many problems exist that no one problem can stand out as a singular one to work on. The problems that are critical that simultaneously exist are: sleep deprivation, emotional vulnerability and emptiness, malnourishment.  Unresolved trauma. Unresolved pain. Unresolved many things.  Lack of motivation. But the key point is: Lack of belief in a brighter future. I don’t think taking steps to improve my condition will eventually pay off, so that’s why I don’t take any steps at all.  I do NOT believe in a brighter future.

Stage 3. Then as I regain hope that there does exist a brighter future, I begin taking steps to get to that brighter future.  Then this stage is where I’m actively trying to make good decisions, but I’m too emotionally damaged to not give in to my emotions and make bad decisions due to sadness/loneliness/depression/etc. I’ll reach out to bad sources of feeling better that keep me stuck in a bad place rather than say sleep early, eat well, exercise, socialize, etc.

Stage 4. Then as I successfully take a step forward in sleeping properly, I regain some sense of control and decision making ability and I start making my bed every morning. I also start watching videos about self help and how to improve.  The process is beginning to take shape and become a habit for me: a habit to improve my situation.

Stage 5. Then I start organizing my life. I start keeping a schedule. I start setting goals for the day, tasks, and then completing maybe one of them.   I might complete 4-5 tasks a week, which is an extreme improvement from 0 tasks due to 0 belief in a brighter future and 0 motivation to take any step towards improving my situation.

Stage 6. As the steps forward and the task progress continues over weeks and weeks, I begin having the self worth and self confidence to face the world and reach out to friends to socialize.  To take walks and get the valuable exposure to nature/weather/sun/out doors/fresh air/new experiences/contact with other humans/etc.

 

Let’s revisit each stage now and see what you could do to help someone else if they were in that stage.

Stage 1 is they are hallucinating. Google how to calm someone down without saying “calm down.”  Be there with them, reach out to them heart to heart and pull them from the darkness that is a world where nightmares and reality have merged and they don’t know what’s stable ground to stand on anymore. Be that rock for them and remind them of the truths of the world.  Gently.  Again, google how to give feedback in a non-threatening way. (Non-Violent Communication Book).  Often just being there and shutting up is good enough.

Stage 2. They are sane, but they have 0 motivation to improve themselves.  In this stage DO NOT TELL THEM TO GO DO STUFF.  Or at least not directly.  Here you have to use persuasion and leadership.  Find a way to make them want to do so themselves, rather than have the motivation come from you.  Develop an intrinsic motivation within them. How? My method is to understand their situation: what do they think about the world that results in them concluding that there is no brighter future? Diagnose their world view and perspective by LISTENING TO UNDERSTAND and NOT to criticize.  Once you understand their point of view and make them feel heard, then you have earned their trust. ONLY THEN can you ask for their PERMISSION to guide them to a better way. This may take days and many sessions but you must go at their speed and be patient.

Stage 3. They have decided to improve their life and they are now on their way and they run into roadblocks with willpower or knowledge or habits or anything at all.  You want to be a supporter. again, NO criticism. Come with understanding, emotional depth of understanding, support, encouragement, and help. Check in OFTEN with them, daily if possible, to see their condition, NON JUDGMENTALLY, and then guide them. Give them the strength to do the right thing by helping them do it. They are very weak at this stage and will struggle without your constant support.

Stage 4. Start complimenting them on what they’ve accomplished, and constantly remind them of what they have accomplished. They are in this world where there’s so much work left to be done. Don’t be the person who makes that stress and pressure worse by piling on more demands and expectations. Give them the strength to face the work by appreciating the work they’ve already completed.

Stage 5. Start inviting them to events to meet in person and socialize or have fun or hang out.  Start feeding them some sense of a life as a normal person. No longer treat them as some kind of special case, but still check in frequently and offer and give help and support, just do so without this “I’m a care taker and you’re disabled” approach. It’s more a “we’re equals, and I’m gonna help you” attitude now.

Stage 6. Continue Stage 5 for another 6-12 months.  Be extra sensitive and don’t start treating them normally until many months after they start appearing to be normal. They will be acting normal, but inside they are still weak. So if you criticize them like you would criticize someone who hasn’t just come through trauma, you will re-injure them and make their condition worse. Just like if you’ve just had surgery, you’re going to “recover” in a few days/weeks, but you won’t REALLY recover for many months.  Emotional recovery is the same. Sure the scar has healed and the stitches are gone, but re-injury is going to be very easy and that wound is very weak so don’t disturb it again for some time. Give it time to be strong once more.

 

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To Provide Effective Care, Seek to Understand First Part 2

Emotional Intelligence

Often times, someone will try to help but fail.  Instead, the person who tries to help will make things worse.  This happens, very often.  When this happens, it is very important for the person who is trying to help to recognize that intent does not equate to reality. Just because you want to help, doesn’t mean you will succeed in helping. Just because you acted with the intent to help, doesn’t mean your actions will help.  As the person giving help, you must take responsibility for the consequences of your actions, regardless of your intent.

A brief story.  Someone tried to help me, and they said some things that deeply hurt me.  I was already hurt, so when they hurt me even more, I snapped past my breaking point and I lashed out at them.  They then accused me of responding to help with anger, labeled me as dangerous, and distanced themselves from me.  When I confronted them with the truth: that their “help” made me feel worse and they should be responsible for that outcome, they said: “No, our intent is good so that means you have to thank us for trying to help. We are absolved of any consequences because our intentions are good.”

Let’s unpack this.  First, it’s important to realize that when you take an action, you should pay attention to the reaction to figure out what the reality of the situation is. If you take an action and the other person gets better, then you can assume that you helped.   If you take an action and the other person gets worse, then you should assume that you made things worse.  Too often people who take an action with the intent to help, blame the other person when the other person responds negatively.  No, this is wrong. It’s not the other person’s responsibility to create a delusional reality for you where every time you try to help you succeed.  You will fail sometimes. And when you do, you will get negative feedback and you have to listen to that feedback.

Second, everyone has a breaking point. A point where they are stressed to the point where they can’t take it anymore.  When they are past their breaking point, they cannot act in self interest, they are acting in self destructive ways and they need external help to calm them down.  If you meet someone in that state of mind, you need to be grounded in reality more than ever and make sure that for every action you take, you are measuring the reaction.  It is up to you as the emergency responder to contribute effectively in reality, not in intention. Intention doesn’t matter if the action taken is counter productive.  The place for intention is for after the episode is over, and you are debriefing in a safe place with other people.  During the event, when you’re helping in live real time, stay present, stay in reality, stay focused on acting in a way that results in a positive feedback loop.

Third. Manage your emotions. Often times you are there to help the other person because you care about the other person and you want that person to get well.  Don’t let your desire for the other person’s well being and your fear for the other person’s condition to blind you from reality and the truth.  Often times, you are so nervous and stressed and worried about the other person that you yourself have become unfit for service. You pushed yourself past your own breaking point of sound, logical, reason, and you become blindly emotional in your overwhelming care for the other person. If you can catch yourself when this happens, take a breath, take a break, recollect yourself before deciding whether you can try again with a sound mind or not.  A sound mind uses reality, uses feedback, looks at the target and sees if the actions taken are helping or worsening the situation to act accordingly and adapt accordingly.

Fourth. When someone confronts you over what you did during an event, recognize that they are not making it up.  If someone confronts you and tells you how they perceived the situation and how they felt and how they were affected by your actions, acknowledge their story! Accept that to that person it is the truth! Then Apologize for the unintended consequences of your actions! Because you did take those actions, and you are now hearing the truth of how those actions were received! Then and only then, after you’ve Acknowledged, Accepted, and Apologized, can you begin to explain your point of view, what your intent was and your reasoning.

In life, there is the Intent and Goal that you want to achieve. There is the Strategy you choose to achieve that Goal.  And there are the actions that you actually take to Execute on the Strategy you have chosen.  Then, from the other person’s point of view, they See only the Actions you take. And they derive Feelings from their experience of your action, and they derive Interpretations of the situation based on who they are.  Often times the Feelings and Interpretations they get are different from the Goal you set out to do. If that is the case, do not blame them for having wrong feelings and wrong interpretations. Recognize instead that your strategy and your execution did not succeed.  Change yourself, because you can control yourself, and don’t count on the ability to change other people, because you can’t control others.

Here’s a podcast with some good tips on emotional validation, a communication skill that is very effective when it comes to giving help and helping someone feel better.  It is about acknowledging and accepting the other person.  The podcast tells you how to do it.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/art-charm-high-performance-techniques-cognitive-development/id212382281?mt=2&i=1000419883909

Seek to understand. If we understood each other people, we could care for one another better.

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Here are the links to Part 1 and Part 3