Lessons from a Recovering Doormat

I’m delighted to have my friend Tina Tessina as a guest blogger. She’s a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist who has written lots of great books and articles. I asked if I could put a sample of her new book in my newsletter. She kindly sent me a sample. With the breakup of relationships rampant, Tina identifies three main factors that can ruin a good one. These tips work for people who aren’t married too and can also help with non-romantic relationships with friends and colleagues. She has a new book, Money, Sex and Kids: Stop Fighting about the Three Things That Can Ruin Your Marriage (Adams Media, 2008).

Learning Self-Control
Adapted from Money, Sex and Kids
By Tina Tessina, Ph.D

One of the most powerful ways I found to stop being a doormat in relationships was to learn emotional self-control. When you’re too reactive to your partner, he or she can easily draw you into a fight that stops you both from focusing on fixing the problem.

When you’re faced with an emotional situation, self-control is not easy. In the face of your partner’s actions, it’s difficult not to react. Learning to stop and think, to respond thoughtfully and carefully rather than quickly and automatically, is hard. However, mastering self-control, no matter how difficult, is always worthwhile, because it makes every moment of your life easier.

Using Self Talk
If learning self-control is difficult for you, one of the most powerful tools you can use to change is self-talk. We all have a running dialog in our heads, which often is negative or self-defeating. The good news is that you can choose to replace this negative monologue with something more positive. The brain tends to repeat familiar things over and over, going again and again over established neuronal pathways. Repeating a mantra, an affirmation or a choice over and over creates new pathways, which eventually become automatic.

The new thoughts will run through your head like the old thoughts did, or like a popular song you’ve heard over and over.

If your self talk feels “naturally negative,” you may be creating a self-fulfilling identity, which saps your ability to choose your responses. One thing you can do is to monitor your self-talk: what do you say to yourself about the upcoming day, about mistakes, about your luck? If these messages are negative, changing them can indeed lift your spirits and your optimism. Know yourself: if you love silence, tend to be quiet, like quiet conversations and not big parties, this may be a genetic trait — your hearing, and nervous system may be more sensitive than others, and this trait will not go away.

You can, however, make the most of it, and learn that creating plenty of quiet in your life will make you a happier, calmer person. If, on the other hand, you’re a party animal – social, enjoying noise and excitement, you can also use that as an asset. Positive, happy people do have an easier time in life, and bounce back from problems faster. There are things you can do in every case to increase your level of optimism, even if you can’t change who you are.

Your thoughts affect your mood, and how you relate to yourself can either lift or dampen your spirits.

Neuronal activity in the brain activates hormones which are synonymous with feelings. Constant self-criticism results in a “what’s the use” attitude, which leads to depression and a cranky attitude, which doesn’t work well in your marriage. Continuous free-floating thoughts of impending doom lead to anxiety attacks. Negative self-talk creates stress.

What I do to help clients become aware of self-inflicted stress is first, to ask them to become aware of what they’re saying to themselves—if there is a constant stream of negativity, it will create stress—just as being followed around by someone who’s constantly carping on you would be stressful. Also, if they’re fighting within themselves—not able to come to a solid idea of what they want—that will make it difficult to make decisions, and increase the stress.

Dysfunctional relationship patterns also are stress-building. For example, if you are constantly guilt-tripped by someone else, or you and your spouse fight, or you are too worried about others’ opinions of who you are and what you’re doing, you’ll be a lot more stressed than if you know how to get along with others, when to listen and when to trust yourself. Most of my clients don’t realize that they are responsible for their own feelings, and no one else is responsible for making them feel better.

To move from powerless about yourself to being in charge, try the following suggestions:

*Make a note: Write positive comments on your daily calendar to yourself for jobs well done or any achievements you want to celebrate. Or you can paste stickers on your daily calendar as you accomplish goals daily frequent positive commentary is a very effective way to reward yourself and remind yourself of your success.

*Look to your childhood: To celebrate success in self-control, use activities that felt like a celebration in your childhood: did your family toast a celebration with champagne or sparkling cider, a gathering of friends, or a thankful prayer? Create a celebration environment: use balloons, music, flowers, candles, or post-its to say hooray!

*Visible reminders: Surround yourself with visible evidence of your successes. Plant a commemorative rosebush or get a new houseplant to mark a job well done, or display photos of fun events, and sports or hobby trophies. It’s a constant reminder that you appreciate yourself and each other; and when you see them daily, you’ll be reminded how powerful you can be.

*Reward yourself: When you succeed at self-control, celebrate with an impromptu lunchtime picnic and a balloon, celebratory sex, tickets to a movie or a ball game, or bragging to understanding friends over coffee. Look in the mirror and tell yourself how proud you are of the new you.

Tina Tessina, Ph.D. is been a licensed psychotherapist in private practice in California. She is the author of eleven books, including the best selling, The 10 Smartest Decisions A Woman Can Make Before 40 , and her newest, Money, Sex and Kids: Stop Fighting about the Three Things That Can Ruin Your Marriage (Adams Media, 2008) Tina also writes the “Dr. Romance” column on Yahoo! Personals and MUCH more! You can subscribe to her free newsletter: “Happiness Tips from Tina” on her site.

Music is many things to many people. As a music journalist, I’m privy to a lot of CDs. Depending on what I listen to, music can energize, relax, lift my spirits, make me melancholy, help me heal. Lola Fayemi at Real World Spiritual and Personal Development tagged me for her meme about inspirational music. Since I feel music has a lot of power over moods, emotions, and spirit, I’m delighted to participate. My music passion is very diverse.

I’ve used music as my drug of choice for as long as I can remember.

Drugs or more than social drinking has never been part of my life. But I’ve always been into music—as a music lover and as a stimulant for my various moods and needs. Years ago when I was still an unhappy DoorMat I lived on Long Island, outside of NYC. At least once or twice a week I’d ride my bike the 20 miles to Jones Beach and back. My only companion during those rides was my little cassette player.

Part of my route was along the water. No matter how unhappy I was, I lapsed into joy on those rides with the help of loud rock music. Arrowsmith. Def Leppard. Scorpions. Good old rock and roll that got my heart racing, my blood flowing, my soul energized. For a few hours, it was just me on my bike as I inhaled the energy of loud guitars and driving music. It was like a vacation from DoorMatville. All my cares were left behind as the music pulsed through me. When no one was nearby, I’d sing along out loud. Those were happy times in an unhappy existence. As life got better, my repertoire of music widened.

My mood dictates what I listen to. I usually have music playing wherever I am. It gives me the adrenaline rush that folks get from drugs. Or the sedative they get from taking pills. Under normal circumstances, I’ve got a variety of current music playing. As I write this I’m listening to the Taking the Long Way album by the Dixie Chicks. My taste varies with my needs. When I’m happy, all music works for me. But when something’s going on, I reach for a CD like some people reach for alcohol or drugs. If I’m wound up and want to relax, classical music soothes me. It also works well when I’m trying to focus on writing the final draft of something important.

For times of calming me down and keeping me focused, I prefer instrumental music. Vocals distract me from concentrating. While I have many CDs that I love, the ones I play the most are by 2 musicians that I know. Robert Stallman’s wife Hannah has been to several of my music industry workshops and turned me on to his brilliant Mozart. I just LOVE his CD, Mozart-Stallman: New Quintets for Flute & Strings A CD that I love by another musician I know is David Stellmach’s Piano Solos. Jazz instrumentals also work well for me. The melodies flow through me, helping my writing and thoughts flow along in a lovely way.

Often we associate music with happier times or incidents that made a big impression.

Sometimes I hear a song or album at just the right time to feel its energy and be nourished by it. That’s the case with Live’s Throwing Copper album. I’d been a fan of Live for a while. Lead singer Ed Kowalczyk’s voice exudes a passion that rocks my soul. I went crazy when I heard Throwing Copper. I was on the move with my career and the CD revved me. It seemed like all my stars were aligned when I heard it.

I played it over and over as good things happened. I loved all the songs and my life kept getting better. It’s a wonder the CD still plays after all the times I’ve listened to it. Whenever I feel down, or things don’t seem to be going well, I play that CD a few times and my stars realign. My mood ALWAYS turns around. ALWAYS! It kicks in the Law of Attraction since I feel more positive and positives come to me! Throwing Copper is definitely my album drug of choice! Lifehouse’s No Name Face album is a close second.

The artist whose songs have probably had the most profound affect on me is Pat Benatar. I fell in love with her vocals, music and lyrics many years ago. They’re still very moving and relevant today. When I give a workshop for women, I often play Promises in the Dark. It’s a GREAT reminder for women about how they can get caught and stuck in a bad relationship. When I had to break up with someone I was crazy about, I played it over and over, singing along for strength.

Many times on my road out from DoorMatville I sang along with Pat’s, Hit Me with Your Best Shot. It always reminded me that I’m strong and capable, even in the face of adversity. As I scream (in private!) “hit me with your best shot, fire away!” I’m talking to life. It reminds me that I’m ready for and can handle anything. It became my success anthem when I needed it and I still smile and get revved when I hear it.

I wasn’t as wild about her last rock album but loved the cut, All Fired Up. I first heard it right around when I was starting to see that I could accomplish great things, on the cusp of moving into a new lifestyle and career. I was running my record label and finally feeling like I had worth. I heard All Fired Up and went crazy! I sang it over and over out loud. I’d play it in the car and scream the chorus:

“I believe there comes a time.
When everything just falls in line.
We live and learn from our mistakes.
Our deepest cuts are healed by faith.”

The lyrics and driving music really did light a fire under me. My faith was in its infancy stages then but growing steadily. I felt spiritual support and the song reinforced it. Shortly after, I was interviewed for a feature story in NY Newsday about being a rapper and starting a record label. As we chatted, I told the writer how Pat Benatar’s songs had been like a drug for me. A week later, the writer called to say that “coincidentally” she’d just interviewed Pat and told her what I said. Two weeks later the writer and I sat in the Chrysalis Records box seats at a Pat Benatar concert. Pat had invited me to come and also to be at her after-party to meet her.

That night was a turning point. It showed me
that dreams can come true and my faith in God increased because I knew it wasn’t all a coincidence. http://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gif

With all of that, the winner of my all time favorite good mood making song is No Rain by Blind Melon. I wanted to see the Banff and Calgary areas in Canada, and Montana since I was 20, when a friend showed me the pics from his trip to both places. I waited for years for someone to take me there. Since I was a Doormat then, I thought I needed someone to go with and lead me. Many years later I decided to go by myself. It was my first road trip solo and I was nervous. I flew into Calgary, stayed a few days, and then drove down to Montana.

The ride from Calgary was long, flat and boring. The Rocky Mountains loomed way in the distance, too far to feel them. As I crossed the border into northern Montana, the terrain changed dramatically. There were rolling hills, lots of green and gorgeous cloud formations. Just as all of this scenery and the emotions of being there hit me, No Rain came on the radio. It has such a happy melody that I began to dance in the car with the joy of the song and the experience I felt.

I’d made it to Montana!! After all the years of dreaming, it was a reality. No more scared DoorMat! I was a happy, courageous warrior girl, meeting a challenge from years ago.

My joy was so strong that I had to pull the car over to stare at the scenery and dance. I pictured the dancing bumblebee girl in the video and danced with her in my head and on the side of the road. Fortunately I wasn’t arrested for loony behavior. EVERY time the song comes on the radio when I’m home, and it seems to still be played a lot here in NYC, I get up and do what I think of as a happy dance. And smile and smile. Every time I hear it! I think God programs it to come on often as a reminder that I can achieve anything I choose.

So you see, music is definitely a big drug for my moods and well-being. I want to thank Lola for inviting me to participate in her meme about inspirational music. A funny thing just happened. I had such a strong desire to get all fired up that I treated myself and downloaded Pat Benatar’s song onto my computer and I’m playing it over and over. It still has the affect on me that it did when I first heard it. I hope that you all pay attention to music that moves your spirit and play it as often as you can. Music sure is better than the kind of drugs you ingest!

If you enjoyed my post, please leave a comment and/or click on the bookmark and write a short review at some of the sites, especially Stumbleupon and Digg. Thanks!

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I got a large response for my post that addressed how compassion can help you temper the buckets of anger we often have when someone does us wrong. It’s a great anger-buster! But developing it also manifests many more blessings. It also helps you to be tolerant of others. As I said earlier, compassion allows you to deal with someone by understanding and acknowledging the person is hurting him or herself more. Situations that create anger are usually very emotional.

But compassion can also serve you well in situations that make you frustrated or at times when someone you care about is doing annoying things you don’t understand.

Developing it can help you refrain from being judgmental about what someone is saying or doing or asking. Have you ever tried to get someone to see your way and they just don’t? Do you try again and again to no avail? You KNOW you’re being clear, yet you also know the person isn’t getting it. That can be very frustrating. Often the problem is someone’s inability to see any way but their own. You might do that too. Believing you’re right about something closes you off to being objective about someone else’s response or needs.

We often only see one way—our own. Frustration with not getting your point across is often also a need to make YOUR view the RIGHT one or to change the person’s view to YOURS.

I’m very guilty of this. I admit to sometimes being a know-it-all about some topics and at times have gotten crazy when I try to help someone by telling them what to do and they refuse to see I’m right. It seems so obvious that my suggestion would solve their problem! I used to get aggravated in these situations. Now I accept—with compassion—that they have issues that keep them from taking healthier action. I no longer want to wring necks or shake people up. Instead, I try to understand.

The history that often gets you into bad situations can also keep you from taking appropriate action.

When I was a DoorMat, I was refused to take advice. Friends pushed me to say no to what ended up annoying me, and to blow off guys who didn’t treat me properly. I endured sarcasm, broken promises, punishment for all sorts of issues that I wasn’t responsible for. But I’d hang in, making excuses because I was scared of being alone. Friends insisted I take action. But I ignored them. I did know what they said was true, just as the person you might be trying to help knows, at least deep down.

But when you’re hurting, you look for the easiest way to momentarily ease the pain instead of taking long-term action.

People stay in abusive relationships, making excuses for their physical beatings or verbal tongue-lashings, while friends scratch their heads trying to figure out why. When you feel unworthy of love, you stay in unloving situations and don’t speak up to people that hurt you. It sounds lame but many people (I was one) are scared to take action and lose the person who hurts them. Since I’ve walked in those shoes, I can now show compassion instead of trying to push others to do what I accept they’re not ready to.

You can give love and support while stepping back from someone doing what you know they shouldn’t. You can’t convince them you’re right if their minds are closed by their limitations.

Understanding the other person’s situation is a key to developing compassion. You don’t need to agree with the person to have it. But it helps to temper anger or frustration at someone’s actions or reactions to you. This works especially well in romantic relationships. Men and women tend to think, communicate and respond to situations differently. That doesn’t make either right or wrong but it does cause problems if we treat the other person like he or she is wrong.

When you recognize where behavior comes from, you can step into the other person’s shoes and feel compassion for their annoying behavior, instead of getting angry or frustrated. This understanding and compassion can allow you to tolerate more and have less negative emotions about it. You still may not like it but it won’t irritate you so much. That helps you find the compassion to develop alternative responses.

Compassion and understanding can create peace instead of always feeling at war with a family member, romantic partner, friend, colleague’s, etc. with expectations, responses, and style that seems counterproductive, silly, or irrational.

For example, in my book How to Please a Woman In & Out of Bed, I try to provide men with the reasons behind some behavior they find so annoying in women. Then can respond with compassion instead of annoyance or labeling a chick with a negative term. I’ve heard from many men who thanked me for explaining how much pressure we have to look or act perfect, which leads to needing so much positive reinforcement or asking those dumb—“Do I look fat?” questions—for which there seem to be no right answer.

MANY people don’t know how to express their needs so they do a little dance around it, hoping you’ll figure it out. Women get insecure over the messages given about our bodies. Yet it’s hard to directly ask for positive reinforcement so they may come across as being too needy. Many men need to feel needed, useful, which may come across as being controlling. EVERYONE has reasons for their behavior. When you try to find them, you might be able to have the compassion to find more effective ways to get along.

In my book I ask men to step into a woman’s shoes to grasp how body image in the media and expectations for looking very good can make women a woman question whether she’s good enough.

The biggest factor that kept me living as a DoorMat was feeling that my body was never good enough. I went to the extremes that women commonly go to—if you’re not perfectly thin, you’re fat. Yet there are reasons why we feel this way. Spelling them out in my book helped many men understand what women need, and why. That helps them do what will get the most mileage with their chickies. The key is having compassion for why women need certain things.

Sometimes you may refuse to cooperate with someone because you just don’t understand why they need certain things. Having compassion allows you to satisfy some of the needs you don’t understand but can do without a big effort. It’s better than fighting or walking around angry. Co
mpassion for a woman’s insecurity allows for kinder responses that actually work. Compassion for a man’s needs to feel in control allows you to let him take the reins a little without an argument.

You can’t insist someone understand your point. Okay, you can try but it will probably make them even less receptive to what you think. It’s better to try to understand why he or she is stuck in old ways or negative patterns and accept it. You don’t have to like it but it’s the way it is. When a woman insists that her guy think or act a certain way, it often turns him in the other direction and the invisible cotton goes in his ears for future discussions. Instead, have compassion for the person’s inability to change right now.

Compassion allows to you agree to disagree. I highly recommend it!

If you enjoyed my post, please leave a comment and/or click on the bookmark and write a short review at some of the sites, especially Stumbleupon. Thanks!

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I have a terrific guest blogger today—Laura Vanderkam, a New York-based writer and author of Grindhopping: Build a Rewarding Career without Paying Your Dues (McGraw-Hill, 2007) Grindhopping details alternatives routes if you don’t want to stay in a job you don’t like, that doesn’t pay well and keeps you working too many hours. Whether it’s freelancing, starting your own biz, consulting, etc., the book details how to blaze a trail to achieving a way to earn a living that you find rewarding and that adds to, not depletes your happiness.

I’ve written about earning a living doing what you love in previous posts. Often the hardest part is figuring out what to do. Deciding What Do You Really Want? begins your path. Then you must begin the process of Finding Your Passions. Can You Really Live By the Grace of Passion? YES you CAN! There are enough successful Grindhoppers who prove it’s possible. Laura interviewed some of them.

Grindhopping gives you many details and examples of how to do that. Reading about how other folks chose to take their destiny into their own hands can give you many tips for your own path, and motivate you at the same time! Laura’s post below discusses how to get up the courage to take a big risk, based on a chapter of Grindhopping. That’s often what most of us need to get going—the fuel to light your fire to go for career happiness. If you have the ability, the ideas, the DESIRE to choose your income path, etc., ask yourself:

What’s the Worst that Can Happen? No, Really, the Worst!
by Laura Vanderkam

About two years ago, I interviewed a rather precocious young entrepreneur named Mena Trott. Not yet 30 at the time, she and her husband Ben had been getting a lot of attention for their blogging software company, Six Apart. They already employed well over 100 people, and Mena had been named one of PC Magazine’s 2004 People of the Year.

But, Mena informed me, things had not always been easy for the Trotts. She and her high-school-sweetheart-turned-husband went to work for a dot-com during the Silicon Valley boom. Then they got laid off. During their protracted period of unemployment, Mena started keeping an online diary about her life that she shared with friends. She wasn’t particularly happy with the available web-logging software, so she and Ben developed better tools for themselves and their friends to use. They didn’t plan to start a company, but if people liked the software, well, the Trott Rent Fund would take donations.

They launched Movable Type version 1.0 on October 8, 2001. That was not a particularly auspicious time for Internet businesses. But a reasonable number of people downloaded the software. They got a lot of positive feedback, and the donations coming in actually did pay their rent. Since the couple had some savings, they continued to work on their product.

But that summer, they had to make a choice. Ben was offered a “good” stable job. You know, the kind with a career track, benefits, etc. Should they go with the easy way and take the steady paychecks? Or should they stick with the 70-hour, underpaid weeks?

In the end, they decided to commit themselves to Six Apart. That turned out to be a wise choice. As blogging took off, so did their software. An investor actually dragged them to Japan to tell them why they needed funding. Headcount began to rise. Millions of people now share their wit and wisdom online with Six Apart’s tools.

But none of that was clear when Ben decided to turn down his job offer. I asked Mena how she and her husband had been able to take that risk. What was their philosophy? “It’s important not to be fearful of things,” she told me. “It’s easy enough to recover from minor mistakes that you don’t have to be paralyzed into not doing anything.” Along the way, she also started making a calculation: What’s the worst that could happen? “If this company failed tomorrow – God forbid – I’d still feel like I’ve learned so much that I couldn’t have learned otherwise,” she said.

After interviewing approximately 100 young entrepreneurs for my recent book, Grindhopping: Build a Rewarding Career without Paying Your Dues, I realized that Mena isn’t the only successful young person who’s adopted this philosophy. Most of my “Grindhoppers” had recalculated their approach to risk. When faced with a big choice, they asked themselves five questions:

• What is the worst that can happen if I don’t take this risk?
• What is the worst that can happen if I do?
• Is the worst that can happen if I stretch myself really all that bad?
• What is the upside of taking this risk?
• What can I do to hedge against the downsides?

The order of these questions is important. Most of us ask the second one first. When we’re considering a big risk, we think of all the horrible things that can happen. If we quit our mediocre jobs, we’ll soon be broke and living on the street. If we audition for a community play, we’ll be laughed off the stage. If we bicycle through Europe alone, we’ll get lost, get robbed, and probably get horrible food poisoning to boot. Humans are risk averse; it’s natural that we’d worry about these things.

But the problem is that we underestimate the pitfalls of not taking the risk we’re considering. Sure, if you quit that job you don’t like, you might wind up broke. But if you stay for years in a job that doesn’t make you happy, you’ll grind down a little of your soul every day. You might never have the life you want. And that is a big risk, too.

Indeed, it might be a bigger risk than the actual change you’re considering. I finally came around to that third question – is the worst that can happen if I stretch myself really all that bad? – when I faced a big choice a few years ago. I’d always wanted to be a writer livi
ng in New York City, so when I found myself, at age 23, with no job, I realized I could give it a shot. I didn’t have a lot of money. New York is very expensive. My mind wandered, naturally, to the second question. I had images of myself squeegee cleaning windshields of my college classmates who’d made “smarter choices”, like going into finance.

But then I forced myself to ask the third question. Did I really think I’d be stuck squeegee-ing windshields for spare change? Even as a kid I’d always figured out ways to earn money when I needed too. I could make my rent babysitting, slinging lattes at Starbucks, or writing press releases at a travel marketing firm. I actually did the latter part-time for three months until I got a book contract and didn’t need the safety net (see question five – if you’re bicycling through Europe alone, for heaven’s sake, take a map and stash some extra cash in your sock!). The worst that could actually happen, I decided, is that I’d eventually be older, have missed out on a few years of the savings I might have accrued while working a corporate job, and I’d be jaded about the writer-in-New-York thing. But at least I would have tried it. I forced myself to look rock bottom in the face, and decided it wasn’t that bad.

And maybe, just maybe, I wouldn’t have to experience rock bottom first hand. The nature of risk is that big risks can bring big rewards – something we often forget when we’re weighing big choices. Yes, the worst could happen. Mena and Ben could have watched their company fail after another year. But the best can happen, too. I stepped off the train at Penn Station on September 2, 2002, and within a few months, realized I’d made the smartest decision of my life. In my first full year of freelance writing, I doubled what I’d made in my previous “real” job. Because I was living in Manhattan, I got to do such only-in-New-York things like sing in Carnegie Hall with one of my choirs. I even met my husband in a bar in Greenwich Village. None of that would have happened if I’d let the squeegee image dictate my decision.

So now when I’m faced with big choices, I try to remember what Mena Trott and other entrepreneurs like her have realized. You don’t have to be a gambler to take a big risk. You just have to realize that not taking a risk is a decision too—a decision with its own downsides. Viewed that way, there really is no reason to be fearful of things.
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Check out Grindhopping by Laura Vanderkam if you’re looking to change your work life!!

If you enjoyed my post, please leave a comment and/or click on the bookmark and write a short review at some of the sites, especially Stumbleupon and Digg. Thanks!

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