TribeSteemUp bi-weekly question: How do I deal with or accept loved ones displaying self-destructive behaviours?

This is a difficult question if there if there ever was one.

From an outside perspective, the answers always seem so simple to see the "proper" course of action. However, while you are in the thick of it, dealing with your own self-destructive tendencies, the problem is not so simple. Often, YOU KNOW that the suggestions given are helpful and neccessary. But it can be difficult to take those actions. Knowing and doing are two different things...

Life is about Balance

Having understanding, care, compassion and patience is key. This may be easy to confuse with being too lenient which is not good as well. When seeing loved ones dealing with self-destructive habits and patterns, there is a strong urge to step in and want to fix that problem; Solving or fixing the provlem benefits both parties, the one doing the self-destructive behaviour and the one dealing with it. Especially when it seems so obvious what the proper course of action should be.

Change doesn't come easy

We all know how difficult it can be to change our own habits, patterns and behaviours. So it should be a no-brainer that changing someone else is be even more difficult. However, if someone is not ready to change, they simply wont. True change comes from within, and if we change solely for the benefit of others and not ourselves, we are very likely to revert to our old ways of being in short periods of time.

Don't be an enabler, but don't be a hater

An Enabler is someone that makes a habit or activity possible, generally a bad or destructive one. There are two types of enablers: overt and tacit. Overt enablers support someones bad habits by providing some sort of assistance, wether it be monetary, providing approval or some other form of observable support, such as giving rides, providing substances or money to support the behaviour. Tacit enablers are ones who stand silent in the face of destructive behaviours, often thinking that the problem will go away by itself. Neither of these is good, but at the opposite end of the spectrum, too much pressure to change is also not a good thing.

Newtons third law of physics applies to a lot of things, and it states that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Sometimes too much pressure on a person to change results in the person feeling controlled and nobody likes to feel that way. Feeling that way often results in 'rebellling' or simply causing the loved one to have to hide their behaviour.

Sometimes it's not easy to avoid being an enabler, or a hater. What I mean by a hater is yelling at the other person (not that sometimes yelling isn't warranted) but life is all about balance, and it is certainly tricky to find that middle path. We don't want to sit idly by while the behaviour continues, but knowing that change is sometimes difficult, if not at times, impossible, try not to be too much of a hater. Have compassion, understanding and love, although this admittedly isn't easy. Emotions can get the best of us sometimes.

Life isn't easy

The experience of life is sometimes beautiful, sometimes painful, sometimes more than those and everything in between. It's hard to know what the proper course of action is to take. Often we don't see clearly until after we are out of a certain situation. However, sometimes it is necessary to let go. Not an easy thing to do, but necessary. Through attachment, we suffer in this constantly shifting experience of life. Sometimes we have to let go of our old emotions, we need to realize when certain life situations aren't serving us. If we are feeling like another's actions are causing us too much pain, sometimes it's in the interests of both parties for one to cut the link and say Enough is enough. Sometimes, this is impossible or simply too difficult but there are times(and I daresay, more often than not) we need to be selfish, look after ourselves and cut ties with people if their actions are harming both them and you. Maybe doing this is more painful than staying together. You have to follow your own intuition when making these decisions. Emotions however can cloud our judgements, and learning to distinguish between the two is an entirely other topic worthy of it's own investigation.

Communication: Damnation or Salvation?

Learning better ways of communication is a life skill that is applicable to almost every human sphere. For the most part, we seem to communicate judgements more than observations, this is all we have learned and is the one primary mode of communication prevalent in modern times. However, our judgements speak more about ourselves than they do about the ones being judged. As an example, a mother screaming at her kids that they are too messy communicates, in a hidden way the mothers need for order and cleanliness. So often we label others with our judgements which are generally full of condemnation. If we can learn to differentiate judgements from observations we do others and ourselves a whole world of favour.

<sup>You can say anyting to anyone, but how you say it will determine how they react

John Hampton</sup>

An example of a judgement: "Sheryl, you're a rager of an alcoholic." While this may seem on a surface level to be an observation, we could better word ourselves by separating our observations from judgements and learning to share what we observe. "Sheryl, every morning and throughout the day you are drinking." We can then add to our observations with our own sensations, the way that our observations make us feel. In that way, we avoid the condemnation of judgementation and replace that will facts and our own feelings, things that are difficult if not impossible to argue with. Another facet of this is that often, people doing self-desructive behaviours find their rational-lies-ations, their own rational, lies come into question... because often these rationalizations include the attitude that the destructive-behaviour affects only themselves. However we know that in this interpersonal existence of life, we seldom exist in our own isolated bubbles, our words, actions and inactions effect others and thw world at large as well. Realizing those things brings great food for thought for those dealing with self destructive behaviours, brings those behaviours into questioning, and can often catalyze change.

BE THE CHANGE THAT YOU WANT TO SEE

At the end of the day, it's up to you to decide how to react, every situation is different and what would work in some may not work in others. However, I would certainly advise having more open communication with your loved ones in more loving ways. A great technique to learn is Nonviolent Communication as discovered by Marshall Rosenberg, who stumbled across this notion of just how flawed and judgemental most of our communication is and worked on ways of transmuting that into more productive methods of sharing what we are experiencing in our lives with others. The dance of humman communication is not an easy one and like an old friend of mine used to say, "The most often used human form of communication is mis-communication." Learning to better communicate with others is key in creating the change that we want to see in the world, but that starts from within you.

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Thanks for reading! Hope this brings you some modicum of efficacity when dealing with others 🗣