Recognising little steps…of interest!!
Torrey Orton – January 7, 2011
If you don't recognise the step you've just taken,
you won't know where you've come from,
where you are, or
where you've got to….
Of all the wonders of therapy, the ways of learning are the grandest and most marvellous. They are also often invisible to the client at the start of their development / recovery. Part of their obscurity to the actor's eye lies in their size – they are little steps, in little ways about large matters for them. We are not accustomed to seeing the detail of our behaviour except when we are learning something for the first time. Then attention to detail is absolutely required because we are, in a sense, making it up as we are doing it.
In addition, habitual behaviour depends on precisely not looking at the detail of its production; it functions automatically to free us up to pay attention to more demanding, non-routine matters. In that respect we are intentionally, but unconsciously, blind in that area at that moment. Hence the jolting shock of discovering that the terrain we were crossing has a suddenly more demanding character – a hole that could not have been seen until we were on the edge of it, and missed then because we were looking down the track.
Rough surface
The stumble tells us, if not a fall which is more damaging. I've had a couple of these driving lately where a "
rough surface" sign should have been and wasn't, and a dented wheel rim was almost the price. The whack /thump of the plunge into a 10cm hole was followed half a second too late by my "oh shit…" appreciation of its arrival. For a therapy client such holes are just what their defences are arrayed to prevent: having certain kinds of feelings which are attached to certain life experiences – the triggers of their anxiety or depression. The learning needed for recovery is through pathways inhabited by their feared experiences so as to disarm those experiences, and eventually pre-empt them.
This in turn requires not merely learning kinds of actions, but at the same time learning that they can act in certain circumstances. A simple example is that of a very low self-esteeming depressed person who winces if complimented and never in their own hearing utters a word of self-approval for anything. They may
act self-approvingly occasionally – like by starting therapy or sustaining appropriate exercise or health regimes or performing competently at work. But the evidence of their action has to be pointed out to them, and then it may take a while (weeks or months) to be accepted as such.
A tool box
So noticing that change is occurring is often not easy. Focus on effective action(s) is hesitant, interrupted by recurrent holes in their paths. Sustenance along the way may be an offering of small steps and picking up new ones from a therapist's tool box. It assumes there is a knowable set of domains of human needs / functions that are capable of development. There are six compartments in it, at the moment:
mental competences – intellectual and emotional;
physical competences – perceptual and performative;
moral competences – evaluating and enacting;
cultural competences – role flexibility and integration;
spiritual competences – vision and celebration; and
political competences – initiative and inclusion.
These obviously overlap. Development of mental competences will often have components of the other 5 competences built in or implied by the mental. The political and moral are interdependent. Competences do not occur in a pure, isolated form. Rather they will appear as the aspect of a moment of life which is pivotal for the client's development needs at that time. Or, it will appear as the aspect which circumstances both demand and provide as opportunity for their development.
For therapy clients, and millions of would be self-improvers, there is only one question.
Can I actually change who/what I am now in any respect (assuming I know who or what, other than I am, I want to be and that becoming that is not merely a purchase away)? The failure rate of aspirational (diet fads, makeovers of various sorts, exercise regimes) and inspirational (spiritual, semi-religious and wholly religious regimens) is well known, though the latter are more promising than the former. These are the hunting grounds of shonks. That they survive regulatory regimes and constant warnings ensures us that the felt need to change is great (whatever its provenance).
The following is a prompt for self-recognition. These can be used to structure and prompt self-reflection. Here are the six of them (the tools in the box) in some detail.
Mental competences – intellectual and emotional:
- A little meditation step for beginners – noticing that you did not do the exercise you committed to doing; thinking about doing the exercise you decided to do daily, even though you did not do it!!
- Seeing something well-known differently, as did this contributor to the "Learning to act right" series, can open doorways of perception and action which revolutionise a struggle for personal effectiveness.
- Noticing a major change of mood which happened quietly – e.g. discovering that he was not anxious about getting to an appointment on time, though the normal conditions for being anxious were all there!!
Physical competences – perceptual and performative:
- Not doing my aikido practices for a long break (3 months) and then returning to find that I could remember all of them (21 moves) and more importantly I could see/feel parts of them which I had not noticed before, and so could improve them for the first time.
- Feeling that an unknown hill has been topped in a performance activity – sport, art, craft or technology.
Moral competences – evaluating and enacting:
- Suddenly seeing that a feeling of revulsion at another's behaviour arose from one's own conflicted values about that behaviour – that one thought at the same time that the behaviour was wrong and that the other had a right to their own values!! See Trusting judgment for an example in detail.
- Recognising that one's injuries cost pain and produced strengths, which others do not have because they have never faced the same challenges.
Cultural competences – role flexibility and integration (eg. gender):
- Realising that one had tried a new food, music, painting without first doubting it…had experienced it in itself, as itself, etc.
- Seeing the world thru another culture's eyes – e.g. gender roles – and acting to meet or join that world.
Spiritual competences – vision and celebration:
- People with religious upbringings which they have rejected, or been rejected from, often benefit from revisiting it by attending a service, a function (confession, baptism) or just the music.
- Noticing that his professional practice had ceased to be onerous and become what he looked forward to, almost from the finish of the previous practice session.
Political competences – initiative and inclusion:
- Writing a letter about a personally salient issue.
- Speaking up in public about a group issue, at work or socially.
- Inviting others to participate in a public process, at work or socially.
Search for interest
What's going on here is a search for interest(s), for the feeling of interest which is the core feeling* among the many striving for our attention. Little steps can often be identified by asking, 'What's my interest at the moment, what's in my actions now that is driving them??' But then you have to notice a step to ask the question. Certainly we can do that, but maybe we can do it quicker and with greater certainty. We know that the steps are moments of desired change. Even missteps can be useful signs of development, since the acknowledgment of them indicates there is a value or standard in the background which is evaluating our actions. Back to the discussion with Ian:
If you don't recognise the step you've just taken,
you won't know where you've come from,
where you are, or
where you've got to….
*"The emotion of interest is continually present in the normal mind under normal conditions, and it is the central motivation for engagement in creative and constructive endeavors and for the sense of well-being. Interest and its interaction with other emotions account for selective attention, which in turn influences all other mental processes."
Emotion Theory and Research: Highlights, Unanswered Questions, and Emerging Issues
Carroll E. Izard , Annu. Rev. Psychol. 2009. 60:1–25
Emphasis supplied.
