Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #982 Judgement & Criticism Are Out!

Transcript

#982 Judgement & Criticism Are Out! · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast. It's the podcast for the
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: time poor parent who just once answers. Now. So good
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: to have you joining me for the Happy Family's podcast.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: My name is doctor Justin Coulson, the author of a
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: bunch of books about making your family happier. Normally I
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: would do this podcast with my wife Kylie, but she's
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: lost a voice. Can't podcast with no voice. That was
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: a double negative. Kylie won't be joining me because you
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: won't be able to hear her. Her voice is totally gone.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: It's actually very quiet around the house at the moment,
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: and I miss her. I miss her voice, and I
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: really miss her with the conversation that we would normally
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: have on a Friday. To change things up though a
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: little bit of background, Kylie and I were asked to
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: give a talk about families, parenting, and relationships at church
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: a couple of weekends ago, and since Kylie can't be here,
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: I thought I might share with you what we shared
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: because I think it's going to make a great podcast episode.
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: There are some religious themes. I know that not everybody
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: who listens to the podcast. In fact, many people who
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: listen to the podcast don't have a religious bone in
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: their body. So I'm going to dial down that aspect
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: of it. You're not here to be preached out. You're
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: here to hear parenting, and that's primarily what you're going
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: to hear. Let me dive into it, though, and share
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: this with you. I think that of all the things
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: that I could share with you, this is the kind
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: of stuff that will make your family happier. In The
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Stephen Covey tells the
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: following story quote. I remember a mini paradigm shift I
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: experienced one Sunday morning on a subway in New York.
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: People were sitting quietly, some reading newspapers, some lost in thought,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: some resting with their eyes closed. It was a calm,
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: peaceful scene. Then suddenly a man and his children entered
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: the subway car. The children were so loud and rambunctious
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: that instantly the whole climate changed. The man sat down
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: next to me and closed his eyes, apparently oblivious to
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: the situation. The children were yelling back and forth, throwing things,
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: even grabbing people's pace. It was very disturbing, and yet
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: the man sitting next to me did nothing. It was
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: difficult not to feel irritated. I could not believe that
• 2:08
  Speaker 1: he could be so insensitive as to let his children
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: run wild like that and do nothing about it, taking
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: no responsibility at all. It was easy to see that
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: everyone else on the subway felt irritated too, so finally,
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: with what I felt was unusual patience and restraint, I
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: turned to him and said, sir, your children are really
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: disturbing a lot of people. I wonder if you couldn't
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: control them a little more. The man lifted his gaze,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: as if to come to a consciousness of the situation
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: for the first time, and said, softly, Oh, you're right.
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: I guess I should do something about it. We just
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: came from the hospital where their mother died about an
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: hour ago. I don't know what to think, and I
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: guess they don't know how to handle it either. Can
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: you imagine what I felt at that moment? My paradigm shifted. Suddenly.
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: I saw things different, and because I saw differently, I
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: thought differently, I felt differently, I behaved differently. My irritation vanished.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: I didn't have to worry about controlling my attitude or
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: my behavior. My heart was filled with the man's pain,
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: feelings of sympathy and compassion, flowed freely. Your wife just died. Oh,
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: I'm so sorry. Can you tell me about it? What
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: can I do to help? Everything changed in an instant
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: close quote. Judgment is when we criticize or condemn someone
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: from a position of assumed moral superiority. And that's the
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: problem with judgment. It presumes that my view is the
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: standard of truth. It exalts my needs while denigrating yours.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: My moral superiority, My judgment, my criticism, and condemnation allows
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: me to be full of indignation in my least positive, helpful,
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: and righteous moments. It assumes that the best way for
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: me to help you is to paint your errors in
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: vibrant colors. And the terrible news is that we do
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: it all the time. It happens at work, it happens online,
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: it happens at church. But worst of all, it happens
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: in our most important relationships friendships and with loved ones husbands, wives, children, friends,
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: exes that we coperent with and so on. One time,
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: when I was younger and not quite as wise as
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: I have become through negative experiences, I walked into the house.
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: Kylie had cleaned it all day while I've been at work.
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: It looked amazing, but there was still some dust on
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: the fans, which I felt judy bound to point out
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: that judgment was not good for my relationship. Another time,
• 4:43
  Speaker 1: Kylie had somebody visit her and drop off a meal
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: shortly after one of our babies had been born. She
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: walked in with treats, flowers, a meal, dropped it off
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: and left. Kylie will grateful for the meal, felt like
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: her friend could have stayed and talked, after all, that's
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: friends do, and for some time felt judgmental towards that friend.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: It was only some years later when the friend explained
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: that at that time in her life, she felt like
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: everything was falling apart and all that she could do
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: was what she did. The conversation would have been too much.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: See what happens when we get judgy and critical. When
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: we begin to condemn those around us, Our emotions go
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: up and our intelligence goes down. We choose to focus
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: on our perspective and we stop seeing things from another
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: person's point of view. We become critical and judge, We
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: reprimand rather than understand, we explode rather than explore. A
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: wonderful friend of mine once shared that the only one
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: who should be judging is one who knows everything and
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: loves perfectly, which rules most of us out in this light.
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: We had a similar experience just a couple of weeks
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: ago that Kylie shared in I'll Do Better Tomorrow right
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: here on the podcast, either last week or the week
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: before to refresh your memory. We just farewelled Ella, our
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: twenty year old daughter, as she departed to do mission
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: service in Canada. Leaving the airport, our three youngest girls
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: decided that they wanted to drive home with Chanell, our eldest,
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: being with their six month old niece. Chanell's first daughter,
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: our granddaughter, was the draw card. Walking to the car,
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: our fifth daughter, Lily, began fighting with her sisters about
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: who was going to sit where in the car. Chanelle said,
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: if this keeps on going, you're not going to be
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: driving home with me Lily and Lily stormed off, so
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: Kylie followed, preparing her incisive remarks about Lily's behavior as
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: she walked toward her. As Kylie neared Lily, she sought
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: Lily's tears and fortunately her heart turned away from judgment
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: and criticism and condemnation, Kylie decided to get curious, not furious.
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: She considered the context and invited Lily to share why
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: she was so upset. The next five minutes, they pretty
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: much stood and hugged in the car park, grieving the
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: goodbye that they just shared with Ella and the fact
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: that we won't see her for eighteen months. Now, I'm
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: going to share a couple of quick things that are
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: religiously oriented, and then I'm going to get back into
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: the parenting. For those who have a religious background, you'd
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: be familiar with the scripture in John chapter thirteen, where
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: Jesus says that we ought to fix one another. As
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: I've fixed you, that you also fix one another. Now
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: everybody knows that's not what he said. He said love
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: one another, not fix one another. But we get so
• 7:32
  Speaker 1: caught up in trying to fix. In Matthew on the
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said, and why beholdest thou
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: the moat that's in thy brother's eye, But consider us
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: not the beam that is in thine own eye. In
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: other words, we're also imperfect. A judgment is so flawed,
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: and our job is not to be judgy and keep fixing.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: Yes we can have expectations, Yes we can encourage and guide,
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: but fixing is not part of the pro In one
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: of the most challenging periods of our lives in relation
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: to our eldest daughter, we took the challenges that she
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: presented to us very very hard. Those challenges shook us profoundly.
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: After all, I was a parenting expert, and so we
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: began to question a lot of things in our lives.
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: Our initial response was to parent harder. We increased preaching
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: at her and fixing her and coercing her and begging
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: her and punishing her and berating her and judging her
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: and pushing and pulling and provoking, and in our mind
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: our judgment seemed correct, and maybe it was. But that
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: behavior on our part drove her out of our door,
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: an out of our arms, and away from our influence.
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: And so then we found ourselves saying things like, well,
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: this is on her. It's her fault. She's done it
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: to herselves, she's done it to us, she's done it
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: to our family. She's the one that needs to change.
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: We're doing the right thing here. She's the one that's
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: making the mistakes. And we didn't really want her around anyway,
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: because we became fearful that her decisions would infect our
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: other children. But here's the thing, our demands were unfruitful.
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: When we had a conversation with a wonderful friend and mentor,
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: he counseled us that love was the answer. But our
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: daughter seems so unlovable, and she made it clear she
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: did not want our love. Apart from that, how do
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: you love her without it making look like you're condoning
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: what she's doing. Well, it was around this time that
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: I had an insight. I didn't have the right to
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: correct anyone I didn't love. Now that seems reasonable to say,
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: but there's a trap there. When I feel genuinely loving
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: towards someone, I generally lose interest in correcting them. I
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: just want to love them. I want to have them
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: close to me. See, my daughter wasn't the problem I was.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: It was my judgment that was driving the wedge in
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: the family. It was my judgment that made her feel unwelcome.
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: It was my judgment that was pushing her away, and
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: that meant that Kylie and I could have zero influence.
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: Our home was not the safe haven that it ought
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: to be for her. We were the problem. We were
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: trying to fix our or. One of my all time
• 10:02
  Speaker 1: favorite quotes that does come from a religious leader, but
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: doesn't really have much of a religious undertone. Is this
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: he says, When a battered, weary swimmer tries valiantly to
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: get back to shore after having fought strong winds and
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: rough waves, which he never should have challenged in the
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: first place, those of us, who might have had better
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: judgment or perhaps just better luck, ort not to row
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: out to his side, beat him with our oars and
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: shove his head back underwater. That's not what boats were
• 10:35
  Speaker 1: made for. But some of us do that to each other.
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: As I reflect on the things that I've talked about,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: there's a quote that really means a lot to me.
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: It comes from a talk called the Virtue of Kindness,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: and here's what it says. Kindness is the essence of
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: a wonderful and good life. Kindness is how a christ
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: like person treats others. Kindness should permeate all of our
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: words and actions at work, at school, at church, and
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: especially in our homes. There is no substitute for kindness
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: in the home. But you ask, what if people are rude,
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: love them, If they're obnoxious, love them, But what if
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: they have fanned? Surely I must do something, then love
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: them wayward. The answer is the same, be kind, love them.
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: Who can tell what far reaching impact we can have
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: if we are only kind. So that's basically what we
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: shared now. There does need to be limits. We do
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: need to be kind and help our children to know
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: that there are expectations around their behavior. But when we
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: do that kindly, we just get so much better results.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: I hope that as you've listened to that you've found
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: some inspiration in there. Maybe this will help you to
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: be better tomorrow. If your children are driving you crazy,
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: as children often do, Hopefully there are some words there
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: that will be encouraging for you this weekend and into
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: next week. Thank you so much for listening to the
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: Happy Families podcast. On Monday, assuming Kylie's voice is better,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: we're going to be talking about one of the hardest
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: decisions that I've ever seen on social media. If you
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: had to leave your daughter in a forest with either
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: a man or a bear, and you knew nothing about
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: the man and nothing about the bear, what would you choose?
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: That's coming up on Monday, A great conversation that I
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: think you're going to love if Kylie gets a voice back.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Thanks so much again for being a part of the
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: Happy Family's podcast. We love having you as part of
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: our community. The Happy Family's podcast is produced by Justin
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: Rowland from Bridge Media. Craig Bruce is our executive producer.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: Have a fantastic weekend and we'll talk to you again
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: on Monday.