What's Keeping You Awake at Night

Part One

Getting started

1

How to use this book

While every problem is different, they all have common attributes. This book has been written to be read in whole or in part, as a general guide on how to deal successfully with problems.

The prime intent of this book is to help you:

observe your default mode when dealing with problems, and then reset it if necessary

understand and differentiate between responding and reacting, and

see how your attitude to a problem will directly affect the way you and others deal with it.

The underlying precepts of this book are:

image 1 We live within fluid and dynamic boundaries, which are constantly changing, being challenged and being breached, mostly in a minor way, but sometimes in major ways.

image 1 Observing and understanding what happens when boundaries are reached or breached is a learnt process. This process is carried out by both individuals and by groups or organizations, who call it ‘risk management’; it could just as easily be called ‘boundary management’.

The more we learn and the more we practise, the better we become

image 1 Like anything else, the more we learn and the more we practise, the better we become at managing challenges or conflicts. This is how we increase our own potential safety, as well as that of the organizations for which we work, or to which we belong.

Mark the areas that resonate with you

My suggestion is that, when you read this book, you mark the areas that resonate with you. Look at the various concepts raised and think about when you have been in similar circumstances or seen similar things happen.

Then reconsider these events from a new perspective, as an objective observer.

Ask yourself:

image 1 What else could have happened?

image 1 What were the other options?

Then ask yourself the why, what, where, when and how questions.

‘Why’ is the emotional trigger or cause, and the what, where, when and how questions are the factual circumstances that followed, as you, and others, perceived them.

Think of the initial process as traffic lights:

The examples and concepts I’m about to share will help you increase your understanding of problems in an holistic way, providing you with a wide range of options for moving, either forwards or backwards, or just staying still.

All of these are designed to keep you safe within your original genetic imprint of ‘Am I safe?’ and enable you to move in such a way that your boundary challenges and conflicts become much more understandable and, as a result, more manageable.

You can make a difference, and different is neither right nor wrong—different is just different.

Key points

How to use this book

image 2 Observing and understanding what happens when boundaries are reached and breached is a learnt process.

image 2 We make decisions first, and justify or rationalize them later.

image 2 There is a major difference between responding and reacting.

image 2 Your attitude will determine the course and outcome of a problem.

image 2 Learn to stop, observe and consider the options before choosing a course of action.

image 2 Different is neither right nor wrong; different is just different.

2

Understanding entities

What does a human being, a relationship, family, company or institution have in common? They are all entities. And what do I mean by that? An entity is something that exists separately in its qualities or relationships. Life is full of entities and units, from the microscopic to the global.

As an example, let’s look at the family unit. At its simplest form, it’s a mother and father, then up one level it’s parents and children, up one more level it includes grandparents and grandchildren, and then on to cousins, in-laws and more distant relationships. The family is an entity; it has inclusive and exclusive boundaries which encompass its members and exclude non-members. In some societies, members who find themselves excluded are referred to as outcasts, making it clear that their exclusion removes any previous rights of kinship.

Another example is the relationship between just two people, a pair. It may be formalized by way of an engagement, partnership or marriage, or it may not. This relationship has its own boundaries, and those boundaries are there to ‘include’ the two people in the relationship and ‘exclude’ others. The relationship is an entity in its own right and is an additional entity to the two individuals involved. A marriage is a classic example of an entity: it is formed officially at a wedding and remains in force until one of the parties dies or the entity is annulled by a divorce or dissolution.

A company, organization or institution is the same: it has boundaries that are inclusive for its members and exclusive for non-members. If you belong within the boundaries of the entity in question, then you have access to its premises, car parks, lunchrooms and workspaces, and your degree of access depends on your place within the group. If you don’t ‘belong’, then your access to any of these places depends on an invitation from someone who does.

What all these entities have in common is that they:

image 1 have boundaries

image 1 include members and exclude others, and

image 1 have their own genetic imprint for safety and survival.

The thing to always be aware of, and it’s something which is often forgotten, is that safety for any organization is not the same as safety for the individuals who make up the organization. Individuals are regularly sacrificed for the good of the group or wider entity interests. And where is the genetic imprint for the organization? It’s in its originating rules and regulations, its memorandum and articles of association that lay out the ground rules for how it operates, both internally and externally, with other entities. Those ground rules are expanded by the common law and other sets of regulations which govern the society in which the organization exists. The bigger the organization, the more complex the rules. And here’s the paradox: those large organizations are all filled with and run by people whose own genetic imprint is asking them: Am I safe?

Brendon is a furniture designer and cabinet-maker. He is highly skilled but not highly valued by the company he works for, so he sets out with a friend and fellow employee to develop their own business.

Together they form a company, with each having a 50 per cent shareholding; they lease premises and equipment and set about looking for work. Suddenly they have monthly outgoings, regardless of their income, and finding work becomes a matter of survival for their fledgling company. Is their company safe? It won’t be if it doesn’t earn more than it spends, and quickly.

Fortunately, because of their reputation for quality, work starts flowing in, but as the volume of orders increases, so does the need for more staff, more equipment and more space. The journey for the company has just begun, and yet, seemingly at every boundary, it has a challenge. How much capital does it need? How much work should it take on? How many people should it employ? Their company is now an entity and has a life of its own, quite apart from that of its founders and shareholders.

Now magnify this by 10 and imagine what will be happening if their company has 20 employees: there’ll be wages to manage, holiday pay, sick leave, quality control, accounts, creditors and debtors—how will it manage? By having a set of rules and procedures that will manage its boundaries, and when a decision is required in all of this, the underpinning mantra will be: Is it safe? In every decision, the question is whether the outcome will enhance the company and secure its survival and success, or put the company at risk. Note that it’s the company which is at the heart of these questions, not the two individuals who started it. Their ‘safety’ in one aspect may well be dependent on their company’s success, but their individual needs will be secondary. It may well be that for the survival of the company an individual or several may be sacrificed—and often are.

Charles has been the CEO of a major organization for 10 years, helping to build it from a two-person entity to one with a multimillion-dollar contract and dozens of employees. For some reason Charles has fallen out with their major contractor, who has demanded that either Charles goes or their contract is terminated. To further demonstrate their intent, they cancel the contract, saying they will reinstate it only when they can deal with a new CEO. The decision for the directors and shareholders is simple. If Charles stays, they lose the contract and the business will close, all the staff will be laid off, and the company liquidated. For the sake of the ‘company’ he helped to build, Charles goes.

Individual safety versus the company’s—he doesn’t stand a chance

There is nothing moral or ethical about this story. The simple reality it demonstrates is that companies, organizations and institutions frequently sacrifice individuals for their own survival. This often leaves the sacrificed individual feeling bitter and resentful; they’ve done nothing wrong, so why should they go? It’s unfair! It is patently unfair to Charles and is yet another example of how bad things happen to good people.

At the point of conflict, Charles’s safety imprint is telling him he’s unsafe and the company is getting the same message. It’s his individual safety versus the company’s, and he doesn’t stand a chance. If it had become an ‘issue’ then the rule books would have come out and, starting with Charles’s contract, everyone would begin reading the rules and regulations to see just how this crisis could be handled. Fortunately, in this case Charles had plenty of options and other opportunities so they were able to negotiate an amicable separation with a good severance package. Notice the word ‘severance’: Charles was being severed from the company so it could survive, in the same way a surgeon amputates a gangrenous limb.

Other entities, including organizations and institutions, are the same: they will all jettison innocent individuals for their own survival. The early history of organized religion is full of similar examples, and even had a word—heretic—to brand anyone who did not believe in the accepted rules, practices or interpretation of their faith, whatever that may have been: Christian, Moslem, Judaic, Protestant, Catholic…the list is endless. And what was a heretic?

Entities jettison innocent individuals for their own survival

Technically and according to the dictionary, a heretic was a ‘free and independent thinker’; but being a free and independent thinker was, and still is, a threat to organized and ‘structural’ thought, so heretics were classed as non-believers. Heretics doubted and thereby threatened the survival of the organization by undermining its structure. Galileo, whose crime was to say that the Earth rotated around the sun rather than the other way around, threatened the Catholic Church, which believed that the opposite was true. He was right, of course, but at the time his discovery was a heresy, a free and independent thought.

Each entity is underpinned by its own need and drive for safety

The common ground for all entities—individuals, relationships, families, companies, organizations and institutions—is that they are all underpinned by their own need and drive for safety, and that they all make decisions first, then justify or rationalize them later.

Organizations will sacrifice individuals for their own good, regardless of that individual’s needs, resources or feelings. The individual being sacrificed, however, has all of those things to consider, as well as the sheer injustice they perceive (often quite correctly) of what has happened to them. In the Old Testament the sacrificial lamb was always as young and blemish-free as possible—in a word, innocent. Somehow we’ve forgotten that, and people being sacrificed see themselves as being guilty or unworthy because they’re being sacrificed. So despite all the effort that goes into emphasizing that it is the position that’s been made redundant, not the person, the person involved will always take it personally. They can’t help it—their genetic survival imprint is screaming loudly: Unsafe! Unsafe!

The lesson in this for all of us is that the good of any organization we may currently belong to will only temporarily include us, and for only as long as we can benefit the organization. If we fail to benefit the organization—or, worse still, threaten it—we become highly disposable. That’s just the way it is.

Individual’s needs are set aside for the greater good

While I’m writing this, the international money markets and global economy are in a state of turmoil. President Obama and his administration are trying to shore up the US economy as the world heads into global recession. By pumping trillions of dollars into ailing banks, businesses and industries, the American taxpayer, via Washington, has been used to shore up the financial collapse of the share- and money-markets. In this process, the detriment this might cause to any individual—including the taxpayers who will be funding it and who might lose their homes, jobs and businesses—is completely irrelevant. Their needs will be set aside for the greater good, or the perceived greater good, and for the need for the entity called the US economy to survive.

Key points

Entities

image 2 Entities exist in a multitude and variety of formats.

image 2 Entities are inclusive of their members and exclusive of non-members.

image 2 Entities will frequently sacrifice individuals for their own survival.

image 2 Bad things happen to good people.

image 2 Both individuals and entities make their safety decision first, and justify or rationalize it later.

Part Two

Special communication categories

3

Communication categories—an overview

Communication is the stone wall of civilization, and the means of communicating are the building blocks. In our dealing with various entities, some blocks will appear fixed and made of stone, while others will be less stable and more uncertain. Some of the more common communication frameworks we will all be familiar with are:

image 1 family: children, adult children, parents, aged parents, step-parents

image 1 work: work colleagues, employees and employers

image 1 professional: lawyers, teachers, bank managers and accountants, and doctors and other health professionals (public and private)

image 1 challenging individuals—exceptions to the rule: narcissists, the clinically depressed, the overly anxious.

Key points

Communication categories

image 2 There are common communication categories which reflect our social structures: family; work; professionals; challenging individuals.

image 2 Each group has its own dynamic and set of boundaries.

image 2 It is important to acknowledge and respect these dynamics and boundaries in order to communicate and problem-solve effectively within the group.

4

Family

Families present both a very real communication challenge and a very important communication structure. The first challenge arises from the generally accepted social perception that families are really safe places for their members: often they are not. In fact, for some people in some families, being in their family is the single most unsafe place they can be.

Families are entities whose members belong not by choice but by an accident of birth, or by marriage. Either way, its members enter into a commitment within a group that will sit somewhere between being highly functional, safe and secure, or seriously dysfunctional, unsafe and insecure, and, at various times, somewhere in between. The key thing for us to be aware of is that this dynamic range exists, and, if we believe or think something is going wrong within our own family group, or someone else’s, it probably is.

Families, sadly, are not necessarily an automatic and inviolable sanctuary. Families as human entities both benefit and suffer from the full range of human emotions. Families develop communication patterns specific to their own circumstances, and once these patterns are established, they become the ‘norm’. By this I simply mean normal within that family group—it doesn’t mean they are necessarily normal within a wider social or community group or within generally accepted social standards. Many people who end up in therapy or counselling in later life do so as a result of becoming aware of their own family’s communication dysfunction, and they are trying to remedy the effects that the dysfunction has had throughout their lives. Families have highly structured communication channels which directly connect their weakest and strongest members. The strongest flow of communication comes from the parents or a parent, setting the direction and control of the family, with the rest following. The members closest to the power source have more control than those further away.

Children

Families have highly structured communication channels

Children communicate directly from a level of safety; the younger the child, the more direct their need and the communication. Their basic needs are the safety afforded by love, food, water, warmth and shelter. They express their needs with a range of verbal sounds, which are then marked by an increase in volume or intensity if those needs are not met. As children grow older, their ability to communicate increases in skill and sophistication. I once heard a paediatrician being interviewed who said that one of the phenomena he had noted worldwide was the ability of any child anywhere, regardless of colour or culture, to relate to any adult anywhere, regardless of colour or culture. They were able to do this because they were relating on a right-brain level, their communication being intuitive for both adult and child. They were relating at the primary genetic level, the lizard level of the brain.

As children age, their needs change and their ability to meet their increasing needs is enhanced by their learning and use of language to communicate. Their basic needs remain the same, but they now have additional ‘wants’, and these can be endless. Differentiating between needs and wants is a challenge faced by every parent, and those challenges increase until the child leaves home to further pursue their own independence. Once they leave, the direct physical control exerted by their parents diminishes, but not the psychological control, which is a whole ‘other’ process. Psychological controls need to be consciously released just as much as the physical ones. In some families it never happens, and psychological controls remain a communication battlefield until the parent or child dies.

I once asked a woman who was having a problem with her daughter how old her daughter was. ‘Seventy,’ she said, ‘and what’s that got to do with you, or with anything for that matter?’ She was right. In families, parents remain parents until the day they die, and their children remain their children. Their respective ages have nothing to do with anything when it comes to family communications.

Adult children

An adult child is an oxymoron; theoretically, it’s not possible. In terms of family communications, however, adult children are alive and well. Becoming adult children is something that happens to all of us. Communication between parents and their adult children is simply a continuation of the family communication dynamic that they all grew up with and regard as normal. They will sometimes converse as adult to adult, sometimes as adult to child, and whatever their earlier established patterns were, then these patterns are repeated. Nothing changes. A great source of communication difficulties with adult children happens when a third party, usually a new spouse, is introduced into the family dynamics. This immediately destabilizes the existing equilibrium and begins to rearrange and reset the whole issue of dominance and control in the new and developing relationship.

Who knows best for the adult child: the parents who have known them literally all their lives, or the new spouse who may have known them only for weeks, months or a few short years? Mothers-in-law are often targeted as the main cause of these problems, having been more directly involved in the raising of their children and not wishing to let go. However, fathers-in-law can be just as bad. There’s that word again: ‘bad’. It’s neither good nor bad, it’s just different. A new set of boundaries is being formed, and the old ones are being diminished to make space for the new. There is a saying that you cannot give something without taking it away from somewhere or something else; it cannot come from nowhere. In the case of adult children forming new relationships, that energy and input comes at the expense of, and from, their old family structure. It is quite natural for some parents to fight a rearguard and protective action to try to prevent their losses from being too great. For them, it’s about repelling an invasion of their territory. Adult children remain just that: adults and children living within set communication channels that they seek to challenge, vary or change, just as they have always done, but with the added dimension of adulthood.

Parents

Parents form the communication powerhouse within a family. Parents, like children, become caught in societal role-playing, and on the whole will try to do what every good parent should. Note the ‘should’—it is an imperative. Not could do, or might do, but should do. Parents themselves are trapped by this imperative, because they want to be good parents and do good things for their children.

If they come from the belief system of ‘sparing the rod and spoiling the child’ or that ‘children should be