{"id":976,"date":"2008-06-05T00:05:21","date_gmt":"2008-06-05T04:05:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/?p=976"},"modified":"2008-06-06T15:06:36","modified_gmt":"2008-06-06T19:06:36","slug":"taking-responsibility-for-one%e2%80%99s-own-feelings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/archives\/976","title":{"rendered":"Taking responsibility for one\u2019s own feelings"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Learning to take responsibility for our own feelings can be hard work. Our culture certainly doesn&#8217;t help given its propensity for encouraging a &#8220;victim&#8221; mentality. People seem to &#8220;take offense&#8221; readily at just about anything. And too many encourage that by acquiescing to that weak stance rather than challenge it. I remember a pastoral counseling session with a young lady who would respond to my observational and interpretive comments by saying, \u201cYou hurt my feelings when you say that.\u201d When she said it the third time I responded, \u201cI\u2019m not responsible for your feelings.\u201d She stopped using that phrase (one she\u2019d learned to use in her family) and started listening differently after that.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p><a href='http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pout.jpg'><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pout-220x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"pout\" width=\"220\" height=\"300\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-977\" srcset=\"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pout-220x300.jpg 220w, http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/pout.jpg 338w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 220px) 100vw, 220px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>As Edwin Friedman pointed out often, challenge, rather than empathy, is a better stance for promoting responsibility and maturity. <\/p>\n<p>People who are working toward taking responsibility for their own emotional functioning tend to:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>pay attention to their feelings<\/li>\n<li>remind themselves that their feelings are their own, and not someone else&#8217;s<\/li>\n<li>accept that no one can &#8220;make&#8221; them feel something<\/li>\n<li>accept that no one is responsible for their feeling but themselves<\/li>\n<li>remind themselves that some emotional (feeling) responses are learned (and therefore, can be changed)<\/li>\n<li>remind themselves that some feelings are helpful to a certain extend, but not beyond (guilt, for example).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Like anything involving growth toward maturity, taking responsibility for our own feelings is hard work. And for many, it may be lifelong work. But when the goal is maturity and the capacity to function in more self-differentiated ways, the work is worth it. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.galindoconsultants.com\"><img src='http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2007\/11\/galindobanner5.jpg' alt='galindoconsultants.com' \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Learning to take responsibility for our own feelings can be hard work. Our culture certainly doesn&#8217;t help given its propensity for encouraging a &#8220;victim&#8221; mentality. People seem to &#8220;take offense&#8221; readily at just about anything. And too many encourage that &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/archives\/976\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-976","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bowen-family-systems-theory","category-personal-growth"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=976"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/976\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=976"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=976"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/grace-ed.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=976"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}