Their words and actions may seem like pure idiocy, but, surprisingly, your partner’s responses are rooted in physiology. What is going on, says psychotherapist Nancy Dreyfus, author of Talk to Me Like I’m Someone You love: Relationship Repair in a Flash, is that in the midst of a fight our bodies go into fight or flight mode. Our instincts rev up on high alert.

During these moments of elevated chemistry we are actually looking for danger. Typically, we find it pretty fast. Even within an apology. “When your partner says, ‘I’m sorry,’ we not only hear the words, but the tone beneath them,” says Dreyfus. “If it’s not wholehearted or there is a lingering edge of exasperation, what we hear is ‘You’re my enemy not my friend’.”

Part of this is due to the fact that according to communications pioneer Professor Albert Mehrabian “7% of message pertaining to feelings and attitudes is in the words that are spoken. 38% of message pertaining to feelings and attitudes is paralinguistic (the way that the words are said). 55% of message pertaining to feelings and attitudes is in facial expression.” so that even a sincere verbal apology may be contaminated by a small percentage of tension perceived by the listener. When our body is in a state of arousal we’re oriented to scan the environment for danger both auditorially and visually.

What complicates the matter is that when the person who receives the apology isn’t buying it, or feels like it’s just being said to shut them up, the apology itself can ignite a cycle where the person sincerely apologizing feels hopeless. When his apology isn’t accepted, it refuels his anger.

This is one of the reasons Dreyfus created her written flash cards which can help couples who are fighting or at an impasse calm down and get through to each other in less than a minute and turn a mean interaction into a loving one. The flash cards are a series of warm and calming self-aware messages that can be held up in the midst of an argument. For example it may be scary to say, “I’m afraid if I say I’m sorry, you’ll make everything all my fault.” But holding up the card can neutralize the difficulty.

A written message diffuses all the subterfuge. “We want to connect,” says Dreyfus. “And from a spiritual perspective, we already are. But in these moments of anger and despair we feel like we’re separate.” The flash cards close the separation. Since they are free from any “tone” their message is also free of any interpretation beyond the words. “Written messages allow us to more simply align with trusting in our connection,” says Dreyfus. “We’re willing to trust that a written message has a purity to it that a verbal message doesn’t.”
 
Another reason why the cards work is that they show that the person using them is making a conscious choice vs. reactive one. Since people don’t typically have the flashcards at hand when an argument erupts they must dash out of the room, get the book and find a fitting card.

The written message, untainted by questionable voice tones, usually has the unique potential of transcending the survival-based paranoia our fight-or-flight response dictates.

A couple who begged Dreyfus for an emergency session on the day she was leaving town for her book tour, found solace in Dreyfus’ advice – and could have benefited greatly from having the cards at hand. This normally loving couple hadn’t spoken in two days….

On short notice the husband invited to dinner someone who was in town for the day whose approval was important to him. Rather than ask, he informed wife ‘We’re having company for dinner.’ They were experiencing financial hard times and couldn’t afford an extravagant dinner but had some frozen eggplant parmesan on hand. The wife, who reorganized her entire day so she could clean the house and get everything prepared for their guest, neglected to read the instructions on the eggplant and just took it out of the freezer to defrost.

When the husband found out that the dinner would be about thirty minutes late because his wife hadn’t micro-waved the eggplant as the instructions said, he went ballistic. He began screaming and saying “You’re not my friend or wife. A friend would have known how important this was.”

This kind of overreacting is the effect of deep childhood wounding, Dreyfus explained. He took her “laxness” about the meal as an indication that she didn’t care as much about dinner as much as he did. Of course it wasn’t about the food at all, but about a childhood wound around a mother who was never in sync with him.

It was as if he was a healthy toddler screaming for his mother to be attuned to him. Early in life this sub-optimal attunement can be life-threatening if a mother isn’t responding to the needs her infant can’t verbalize. In the present, this unresolved issue was transferred to his wife. The first thing he said in their session to her was “You don’t love me.” Everything she had done was meaningless for him. What he was asking for was someone to read his mind and do things exactly as he would have done them.

This form of fight or flight is rooted in a time when survival depended on a parent being able to mind-read the child’s needs. The wife’s “failure” sent the husband into a panic leading him to become enraged and cruel. The wife felt blind-sided as she hadn’t witnessed this kind of behavior from him before. In this instance flashcard #15 could have been an intervention for her. “I am your friend. It is painful when so quickly I become your enemy.”

His possible best bet cards to her: #41 “I realize I’m over-reacting. Can you give me a minute to get sane again?” Or #47 “I was just reacting to you as if you were my mother, and I know that you are not.” Little can calm your partner down as much as an admission of your own insanity, reports Dreyfus.

Not everyone can rush into Dreyfus’ office during a relationship emergency, but the cards serve as a sort of surrogate therapist always on hand with wise advice to suit the situation. With the help of Talk To Me Like I’m Someone You Love turning enemies back into lovers is just a card away.

Nancy Dreyfus, Psy. D. is a psychotherapist, couples coach and former journalist who gave up a job offer at The New York Times, when she realized that reporting on the grievances of the world was only adding more misery to the planet. She now believes that world peace will only come when we deal with the grievances we have with the person we woke up this morning. She wrote her book, Talk To Me Like I’m Someone You Love: Relationship Repair in a Flash as a guidebook for staying true to oneself in life’s messiest moments.

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Photo by Elisabeth Sophia Fuchs, Vienna, Austria

Being overly sensitive to how people judge us isn’t always a sign of low self-esteem; confident women also worry about how other’s view them. We are supposed to be perfect so we work hard to maintain this status. As a successful high-achiever, I have had to learn to take risks, love myself even when I make mistakes, and appreciate my aging body.

I learned my greatest lesson in loving myself in my first improvisational acting class. I attended a week-long camp in the woods in New York. I fumbled and mumbled through every scene and hid out from my fellow campers in the evening. I knew I looked stupid and couldn’t wait to get home.

Then I met Carol Fox Prescott. After begrudgingly performing a short song and dance on stage, she blocked my retreat and told me to repeat the performance. I did. She made me do it again. I did. She said, “Until you arouse every man in this room, you can’t leave this stage.” I saw myself as a corporate trainer and keynote speaker, not a sex object. I was instructional and motivating, not seductive. She made me perform again. And again. The angrier I got, the more I belted out my song and thrusted my big butt and hips around the stage. 

After the ninth rendition, everyone cheered, hooted and whistled. I fell to the floor in tears. Carol took my hand and said, “You have disconnected from your sexuality. Until you find this beautiful part of yourself and share it with the world, you will never fully connect with your audience or anyone else in your life.” I knew in my soul that she was right.

Carol brought me back in touch with the silly, sexy, loving woman that I had lost contact with in all my years of being the perfect achiever. While trying to be the perfect performer, I was not being authentic. Now, being perfectly authentic became my goal, a nobler aspiration than trying to look and act with precision.

Another acting coach Gary Austin told me, “It’s none of your business what people think of you.” He says your business is to give 100% to what you are trying to accomplish. “For every moment you give to thinking about how someone is judging you, you are detracting from your best performance. Quit worrying about what people are thinking and you will perform so well that their opinions of you won’t matter.” Gary helped me to see the pleasure in giving 100% and that people love my messy, silly, imperfect self even more than the “confident high-achiever” self I tried so hard to uphold. I may not sing and dance on stage, but I laugh whole-heartedly with my audience and even at myself.

*If you want to know about how the brain works, check out Outsmart Your Brain: How to Make Success Feel Easy by Marcia Reynolds on Amazon or http://www.outsmartyourbrain.com/.

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In that moment she made the decision to go on the date just to see what it was like to be with someone who didn’t like Her. The guy was hang down miserable the whole time.

“I felt not wanted, invisible, humiliated, hurt,” says Myers. Then she looked at him and saw something surprising. He was really hurting. Myers’
inner strength surfaced and she said do herself, ‘I can handle this.” A few hours later she asked him if he wanted to take her home.

“Yeah.”

This event catalyzed a key world view for Myers and became the early seeds for her work with women and leadership. “I knew I had to love and accept myself and continue connecting to who I am as a person and to connect to purpose.”

When she got home Myers took out some paper and made a line down middle. On one side she listed what was good about herself. On the other side she listed what was bad. On the “good” side she wrote. “I’ve got smarts. I’m not pregnant. I’m not sexually active. I do my chores. I follow rules. I go to school. I’m a nice person.”

On the “bad” side she wrote…well, nothing. “I had a really hard time finding something wrong from the inside out. I don’t like to dust and mom wants me to dust. That was a pivotal moment for me then. Writing became a powerful tool for self reflection.”

Today Myers keeps the essence of what’s on her list in mind. She stays focused on bringing out who she is no matter what she looks like on the outside. Even when she glances down at her sagging stomach, which she calls her “kangaroo pouch”, the aftermath of having quadruplets. She stops herself and says, “No. I make an offer in the world. I make a difference.”

Another practice she began after breaking her back kick boxing was to imagine a tea candle inside herself right below belly button. She took pain killers, as the pain was extreme, so she could continue to work as she was on the speaking circuit. Some days on stage the flame was tall and strong. But on other days it so small a light wind could kick it out.

At those times she would say to herself, “No DeeDee. How can you feed the flame?” She kept visualizing what she wanted with her kids. Myers says that we can locate virtues inside our bodies. For example, she houses courage in her diaphragm. That’s where she goes to find the energy to do a handstand in Yoga. Continuing to find the places where we house strengths can be self generative. By locating those parts we continually connect to what’s good in us.

This is not just an occasional practice. Myers practices being in the mind-set that her body is fulfilling on what it’s made for. “I go home everyday and ask myself, ‘Was this a day well lived?” She also envisions a happy future that helps drive the present. She’ll be 68 when her quadruplets graduate from high school. What’s important to her is to be able to run, laugh and enjoy her children and that she can also live fully in her body and be alive, alert, healthy, happy.

Deedee Myers is an executive leadership coach who supports sustainable changes for individuals, teams and organizations. She is a motivational speaker and author, teacher and coach on leadership practices, effective coordination in teams and living a life of Purpose and balance. As a former triathlete and ultramarathoner Deedee is well schooled in pacing as CEO of the Advancing Leadership Institute, and mother of 9 including twins and quadruplets.

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DeeDee Myers

“That was a big of a grab for me,” says Myers. “My reaction was to get really small and invisible. But part of me was curious. My mother asked me to wear lipstick and light make up. She took me aside and said, ‘This is not fair but people will judge you by what you wear and how you look. Never get fat. Always be healthy looking. Take care of your hair.’”

Her mother was a prestigious banker’s wife who entertained frequently. Although she had twelve children she didn’t look like a “drudge housewife”. The house was always neat and tidy. Her hair was done, her clothes were clean, ironed, and pressed. She had a motto: Always be dressed for company.

This is a script that has played in Myers’ head since the day her mother first schooled her on how she needed to present herself to the world. But today Myers has a different take on it. “It’s the same script,” she says , “I just have a new story. Now I see it as an invitation to always be ready, to extend for what you want, for what’s needed. It’s a lesson to be ready for anything.” That anything can mean stares at the yoga studio and strangers boldly asking, “How are you going to do downward facing dog?”

So Myers shows them and asks if they have suggestions. “At first I didn’t know whether I should try to explain or just demonstrate. I allow people to breathe around their own stories.” When her yoga class recently undertook handstands, Myers had some moments of confrontation with herself. She got jealous and “pissy” that others could do handstands while she couldn’t.

The internal dialog she was running said that this was just too hard. She wanted give up…and cry. Then she said to herself, “You’re 55 years old, how can you say this is the hardest things you’ve ever done when you’ve delivered quads?”

The other thing that happened inside her head is that Myers coached herself. As CEO of DDJ Myers, Ltd. and co-founder of the Advancing Leadership Institute, she’s in the business of giving others advice about how to move through difficulties. So she asked herself what advice she might give herself from a coaching perspective. She said she would try it a few ways and then would ask for help. So that’s what she did.

The next day she told the instructor, “I’m going to do a handstand today.” She spoke it like a declaration.

Startled, he first said “Good,” then asked, “A one handed handstand?”

“No. A two handed handstand one-handed.” Now she calls extreme challenges her “Handstand Moments” and she still has plenty of them.

Like the day she she found a little lump on the tip of her nose. She put off going to the doctor. When she finally had an exam the doctors said it was cancer and scheduled her for surgery. She had a young intern and his team working with her and they initially said they wouldn’t need to cut to the bone, that it was minor. But that assessment turned out to be inaccurate and she had to return to surgery to have her nose cut to the bone.

“At first I didn’t want to look,” she said after the surgery. “I had a hole in my nose.” But every day she told herself to look, and to find the lesson, to love who you are. She started by taking off the bandaid for a moment. Then for a couple minutes. Then twice a day. Each time she looked she said that she “kept locating who I am and loving who I am. We have to locate who we are on the inside, to find what’s good in us.”

Deedee Myers is an executive leadership coach who supports sustainable changes for individuals, teams and organizations. She is a motivational speaker and author, teacher and coach on leadership practices, effective coordination in teams and living a life of Purpose and balance. As a former triathlete and ultramarathoner Deedee is well schooled in pacing as CEO of the Advancing Leadership Institute, and mother of 9 including twins and quadruplets.

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Photo by Aleksandra P., Poland

I’m not.

Last week I performed an experiment. I took off my clothes at my friends house in front of her and her 15 year old daughter.

Why? Because I want to feel completely unencumbered by my body.  I asked permission, of course. And wore good underwear. My friend, being a good sport, said, “Sure, in the kitchen while I cook up the meat.” So we poured ourselves a glass of good red wine, seared some flesh, and heated up the room.

I remember reading about a man in a Tantric workshop who was crippled, yet, when he took off his clothes in front of the group with no artifice everyone saw him as luminous and beautiful. This is what I had in mind for me, in the kitchen. No strip tease, no attitude, no artifice. I wanted to be relaxed and easy, like I am at home in front of my partner, Will, in bright daylight.

At first my friend and her daughter didn’t really look. Then they glanced in my direction once in a while. Then finally they drank me in bit by bit. No one said anything about a particular part. No one threw up. I had wanted to walk around, but I found myself rooted behind the table and chairs. That’s as comfortable as I could get.

But I did it.

The next morning I told my sweetie, Will, what I had done and his reaction was not what I’d hoped for. “You don’t just go to other people’s houses and strip off all your clothes.” He was furious. I was deeply disappointed. He wouldn’t speak to me. I let him be while he thought things out.

That night, before bedtime, we talked. Will said he felt it was a breach of our intimacy and that I had shared something that was meant just for us. For me it was a daring investigation into how I see and live with my body; a personal test.

“What’s next?” Will said. “Nude hot-tubbing with the guys just to see if you can do it? Lady Godiva-ing around your Aikido Dojo?” I can understand his point of view. And by the end of our talk I think he understood mine. I don’t feel the need to escalate. It was a mini milestone for me. For the moment I feel complete.

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It’s common that “small” sexual degradations of a father toward his daughter lead to a diminished sense of self.

I was at dinner with a dear friend of mine and she said to me, “Do you know how much I’ve held myself back because of the way I look? I don’t think I deserve to be in front of people the way I am.” She is a luminous person, full of compassion and brilliance. She is “heavy” and has always worn loose fitting clothes. She is a leader in her field and has held prominent positions at large and respected spiritual organizations. She is like so many of us.

This wearing away at self-esteem started long ago when her father would pinch her and pit her against her mother. She got fat so her mother would be the thin one. At prom time she put on a dress and her father pointed at her breasts and said to her brother, “Look at those sagging five pound sacks of flour.”

This was one of many inappropriate comments that lead her to where she is today. Holding herself back from giving her full light to the world. And hers is a very bright light.

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Today the world told me to let up a little, to not push so hard at doing. I ask myself, “What is rest?” And I must say he’s a poor acquaintance, and often unwelcome at my door.

Today the world told me that perhaps what I wish for is something not so big. A little loosening around the waist and eyes could be good, to let in a little more seeing and a little less thinking.

Today the world told me that a runny nose can be a good thing. I’m moist, liquid, made of moving matter.

A woman client said to me, “I love my baby. I have a good husband, two dogs and a wine cellar full of Beaulieu and Chardonnay and that it is enough.”

My Aunt Rosie keeps in her wallet a 70 year-old photo of her standing slim and proud, her hand on an old Chevy, her head cocked slightly to one side. “See,” she says, “See, I was once thin and beautiful.”

She has never learned to cook, or drive. People magazine is her Bible and everyday the thing she looks forward to is her next meal my Nana makes faithfully, every day. And I wonder, how do we judge a life? The past, the present, the future. What matters most as we sit down to yet another meal?

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I was talking to a colleague who I respect. We were chatting away and suddenly his head turned and locked. Silence. He became mesmerized. No, his brain froze or fried on the spot when a tall woman wearing a tight bright top revealing the exact shape of her breasts began to dance. Her pants hung so low you could almost glimpse her betty.

I thought about snapping my fingers, waving my hand in front of his face, or just walking away. I doubt he would have noticed. Then I realized I was mad. And jealous.

I was mad because I wasn’t commanding his attention with my presence. Sure, I could have yanked down my top so the effectiveness of my push-up bra could be revealed. I could have danced seductively too. But that’s not me. I want to be taken seriously — as a woman, I want to be listened to, cherished, not gawked at.

It’s not that I don’t recognize the power of skin. I just choose not to use it. Years ago, a friend told me that while she was talking to a man she liked she hiked her shorts up a bit so he could get a better look at her legs. This idea was so foreign to me at the time I couldn’t even imagine doing such a thing.

All my life my mother insisted I buy loose clothes to hide my ample ass. It didn’t work. The entire African American male population frequently commented on my “booty.” Some said that I must have Hottentot in my Caucasian ancestry.

Since then I’ve experimented a bit more showing a hint of cleavage, some thigh, clingy pants, but I wouldn’t want the general public to know if I had a Brazilian. Perhaps I’m alone on this. I always thought that a good present gave the most pleasure when it was beautifully wrapped.

Follow Susan Harrow on Twitter: www.twitter.com/soundbitesiren

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