“Those idiots,” Michael thought. “Can’t they see that they’re making a huge mistake?”
Just then his boss, Jim, came in. “Michael, can you explain what, exactly, happened between you and the engineering team? Three people came to me and complained separately.”
“Sure,” Michael smiled at Jim, happy to finally have someone who would listen. “They are entrenched in old ways of doing things that are going to cost the company hundreds of thousands of dollars unnecessarily. They are just plain block-headed! They have a piece of cement between their ears, and very frankly, it drives me crazy.”
Are you like Michael, thinking everyone is just stupid and you are the only one that is smart? And because of it, you are fed up with most people who you see as bumbling idiots?
Here’s where that leaves Michael:
* alone – because he is so superior in his own mind that there aren’t too many people left that he can respect and admire.
* deprived of knowledge – because in thinking that only he has all the answers, he may never have the opportunity to discover that there’s a better answer.
* unhappy – because human beings were made to connect with others and when we cut ourselves off from others we are not happy.
* not listened to – because no one listens to someone who scorns them.
* if he’s married, he heading for divorce – because people who think this way make no exceptions, even for the person they’re supposed to love.
* if he has kids, they also will become estranged from him – because as they grow and formulate their own view of the world, that will be intolerable to Michael.
* angry – generally the worst part of the problem is that people like Michael are always angry at everyone else. No one is good enough or cool enough or smart enough.
They’re angry at themselves if they look closely enough at themselves to take responsibility.
As much as Michael knows it is not helpful at his job to scowl as he speaks of the guys on the engineering team, he can’t help it. His well-taken points are totally lost on Jim who simply does not like his attitude.
“Michael, I find it hard to attend to what you’re saying when you’re putting down three people who have been with the company for twenty some years a piece. You may have some well-taken points, but your superior attitude is getting in the way,” Jim told him.
“I need to see a change of attitude. Pronto. I’m serious,” he concluded.
So there it was. Eight difficult years at this job and now it may be over. Michael is really mad now. He is fussing and fuming. He is ready to start yelling – which would be an automatic prelude to a rapid exit out the door.
He holds himself in check and storms out the front door, walking around the huge city block to burn off steam.
Anger isn’t a bad thing – as long as you know how to use it to make a point rather than IT taking control of you.
That’s the key.
See, the feeling of anger is often quite justified in the workplace. But the expression of anger in a hostile, condescending way is not.
What his boss did not tell Michael is how to accept his anger without making others feel small.
When he puts people down, suddenly the whole reason for the problem is swept aside and his nasty behavior becomes the problem.
When Michael learns the elegant difference between expressing anger in a derogatory way versus expressing it constructively, he will experience radical changes in his life:
- People will listen to him.
- People will like him.
- People will want to be around him.
- He won’t be lonely any more
- And even though he felt superior, he will enjoy the company of others now.
- He will be happy.
- Oddly enough, he will become open to hearing what others say because he realizes he needs to hear other’s opinions in order to get heard himself.
You can see how this has big ripple effect if he’s married and if he has kids. It is really the difference between a satisfying, meaningful life and an empty, miserable one.
So how does he go from antagonizing everyone to expressing anger constructively?
It’s all about both physiology and mental state.
There are two approaches to helping people change their automatic reactions: a bottom up approach and a top-down approach.
The bottom up approach means that we help the body to react differently and the top down approach is we help a person’s way of thinking – their cognition – to change.
Both work with anger, but the best, the most powerful way to get the change you want is a combination of both.
Physiology, the bottom up approach, can be changed with meditation.
I said “meditation” not “medication”!
Our body is the “first responder” to danger and therefore the first responder to stress. By focusing directly on changing our body’s reaction, we automatically influence our brain’s reaction.
The mental state approach, top down, uses tools to help us see things from a new angle.
Once you see things differently, you can never go back to the more limited version you started with. Let me give you just one example. This one comes from Steven Covey’s book Seven Habits of Highly Successful People.
A man and his four kids got on the subway (back in the old days when we could freely ride the subways) and he seemed to not be concerned about their rowdiness. The children were all over the car making noise and just being impossible.
Now, stop for a minute. What do you think of this father? Is he negligent? Unconcerned? A bad parent?
Finally, someone went over to him and spoke sharply about his kids’ behavior.
“Oh,” the man mumbled. “We just left the hospital where my wife, their mother, died.”
Whoa.
Now we see it differently.
The art of a top down approach is to shake up Michael’s view of himself.
Research shows that a combo of both top down and bottom up is quite powerful with anger.
Michael, do you want to save your job – and most likely, your marriage? Get in touch with me and I will walk you through my 12-week program for totally overcoming anger and reclaiming yourself.
If you happen to be a Michael and you think these goals are impossible, don’t give up so fast. I’ve helped many people with the exact same problems as Michael and I can help you, too.
I’ve got an intensive program of group and personal coaching along with 1:1 and joint therapy.
By the end of the program, Michael will have Tamed His Triggers and he will start to like and even Value Himself once again. And he and his wife – and kids and co-workers – will be able to
Talk with Compassion and Honesty.
And what of Michael’s wife? I’d love to hear all her complaints. It helps me understand the situation better. So it’s best if she’s on the call. It’s best if she works with me too. This way, she can heal and they can build something good and positive together.
To get deeper into this information, please join my private group right here on Facebook and get a free gift
https://www.facebook.com/groups/LoveYourselfLoveYourMarriage
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