Instruction Manuals For Loved Ones Bring Suffering
Starting to feel a bit neurotic from being stuck inside with your family?
How many of you are writing “instruction manuals” for how your loved ones should behave so you can feel a little better during this COVID-19 quarantine?
I’m certainly tempted to. I’d love for my kids’ rooms to be spotless instead of a collection of dirty dishes and clothes. I wish my husband would massage my sore lower back and take his two giant computer monitors back to his office downtown. And please God, someone tell our adorable cat to stop shedding so much hair so I don’t have to vacuum daily and start cuddling with me instead. 😝If everyone followed my manuals I’d regain a sense of cleanliness and serenity in my home.
Last week I was deep in conversation with my life coach on a video call when I heard my almost 14-year-old son scream obscene language from down the hallway. My coach stopped mid-sentence in shock. My body tensed for a few seconds.
I had a choice to make. My mind quickly scanned my options. My primitive brain wanted to yell at him for interrupting my call (rude!), for using foul language (so uncouth!), for not closing his door and disrespecting my workspace (selfish!). The incident also itched my general annoyance for having to use the living room for the call instead of my regular office that I’m now sharing with my husband.
But I knew better (from lots of practice). That kind of response would only end up in an unproductive screaming fiesta. Instead, I took a DEEP BREATH and decided to think nothing about my son’s actions hence proceeded to feel neutral. He was playing a game and was just having “emotions” about something. I moved on with my conversation without incident. It was what served me in the moment and I’d address it after my call.
It did happen again later during my call and this time I chose to get up, asked him to lower his voice and closed the door to his room. Later we had a conversation about it and I reminded him of the consequences of of cursing. No matter how he chooses to behave in the coming weeks, it’s important for me to remember that his actions have no bearing on how I feel. Because how I feel depends on my thoughts, not his behavior. My thoughts create my feelings. It’s all about the meaning I attach to his actions and I can choose my thoughts.
The same goes for everyone else in my family. If I let how they behave dictate how I feel, I’m giving my emotional power over to them. And I certainly don’t want to give my emotional well-being over to hormonal teens and a moody cat!
Many of us believe we’d be happier if the people in our life would just change to accommodate our vision of how they should behave. So we spend lots of energy trying to control and manipulate them into acting that way.
“He shouldn’t whistle at 7 am while making breakfast.” “She should take out the compost without me asking.” “He should cook dinner a few times a week.” “He should play a puzzle with me.” “He should stop watching so much TV.” “He should read a book instead of play on his computer.” And when they do change their behavior then we will “feel happy...” or “feel like a responsible parent...”
Manuals are a huge cause of suffering because we hand over the power of how we feel to someone else. But other people’s behavior has no impact on us emotionally until we think about it, interpret it, and choose to make it mean something.
I’m learning that if I can drop the instruction manuals for the people in my life and learn to enjoy them for who they really are, we all win.
It doesn’t mean I can’t have expectations and make requests of them in hopes that they might comply. I just don’t hang my emotional well being on the outcome.
So I invite you to experiment with dropping (or shortening) your manuals for loved ones this week and see what happens. Enjoy and accept them for who they are, not who you wish they would be so you can feel better in some way.
What I expect you will find is that you will regain emotional agency over your emotional life and your relationships will improve dramatically.
Let me know how it goes!
With love,
Melody 🦋
P.S. If you’d like to dive deeper into this topic, set up a free consult ➡️Click here. Live your life with intention, don’t wait for life to happen to you.