Former Community – We Moved
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Bel's thoughts
Hey man,
You're welcome.
For me to better understand: I'm starting to understand it's a close relative. Do you mind sharing who this is? It changes a lot to the situation at least my understanding of it.
Thanks John, but let's keep it at that level for the moment.
Maybe in the future I'll open a specific thread to ask for advice on this.
Alright, I respect your desire to keep it private. I'm basing the feed-back below on the hypothesis it's a close relative.
So here is my feed-back based on the information I have so far:
Asking someone to do a therapy is tricky. They must want to do it. I'm talking about adults here as for children, it's a different case. Imagine if someone would ask you to go to a therapist. How would you feel once in front of the therapist? You might then realize it's an actual good idea, but the probability is quite small. A part of us would resist unconsciously the therapy. That's what happens when for instance the law forces someone to do a therapy. They go but don't commit to the process. Also when one person asks the other to do a therapy, it sub-communicates: "YOU have a problem, I don't", which is not accurate. Everyone has problems that they can grow out of. In terms of power dynamics it's also not so healthy in a close relationship as there is a blame element and therefore a guilty and an innocent. The guilty has now to prove to the innocent that he/she's now good enough for the relationship through the work of the therapy.
Personally, I don't believe much in two-people therapy. I believe in it IF both people do a therapy on their side AND they do a therapy together. Each one must sort their own mind on their side to be able to have productive therapy together. This is my personal opinion based on my observations, I'm not a psychotherapist.
My 2 cents on that is to be realistic with expectations.
So if going from good to great is relatively easily attainable, going from "not good" to great is possible, but, often, not the most likely scenario.
So a more conservative expectation would be this:
- He may have improved a bit
- You probably did improve, quite a bit
So you moved together towards a better end.
The great news is that it will be better.
But by how much?
Like, totally pain-free?
Who knows, everything's possible, but better to at least consider and be prepared there might be more emotional pain and potentially even more power moves.
Including sitting with the therapist.
That can be great, and it's a great sign if he accepts. But in the worst-case scenario you can also end up in a situation where your relative is not there to mend things together, but to compete and win, and tries to win over the therapist and "prove" you're wrong -and a bad therapist might even fall for that-.
That being said, if you're willing to tolerate a less perfect relationship to have a closer relative in your life, then having a less-than-perfect relationship may still be better than none at all.
Thank you so much for your support John!
Thank you guys, I'll think it over.
Thank you so much for your support John!
Thanking back when receiving thanks probably still does not fully acknowledge the emotional bid
Linking to my post here.
Openly discussing costs in abstract with a client is a lose-lose proposition (and also: avoiding "self-disqualifiers")
I had a phone call yesterday with a client who told me he had asked a tax assistance centre to help with an inheritance tax declaration.
I mentioned I also provided this service, then added:
Me: Of course, it is going to cost more than what a tax assistance centre can do, but still less than a notary.
I think this was a mistake, because:
- it focuses on price as if it was the most important consideration, and implicitly deviates from quality considerations which in truth are the most important (if the client is asking me, he trusts the quality of my work)
- it disqualifies me (by mentioning my price is going to be higher) without me knowing if that is truly the case (because the tax assistance centre may even have prices higher than mine, and I do not really know!)
- the client had not even asked: so price could not even have been a consideration for the client, who maybe was focused on quality, and it was me who entered a "disqualifier" into the conversation
In other words, my comment on price was a lose-lose proposition and an insecurity on my part, as if I had to justify myself.
I think I frequently made similar mistakes in the past, and this is something to be eliminated for sure from my talking and writing.
I remember another time I received an email from a lawyer who I had been referred to asking if I could deal with a privacy matter concerning a phone company, and I replied with something like:
Me: ...
I have dealt with privacy matters, although not as concerns phone companies, but am more than available to work on this...
...
I think, in a similar vein, the underlined portion was a mistake (a "self-disqualifier"), and probably the reason why I never heard back from this person.
I think I came to this realization thanks to (first PU, and then) a series of business seminars by Brian Tracy I was listening to lately, where he mentioned that if the client asked to know for the price as first thing, the correct answer should be:
Mr. ..., is price the only consideration for you in this case.
Hello Bel,
to me this looks like self-sabotage. If you think it might be the case I can recommend an audio book that helped me a lot. So I think this one is on the mindset/beliefs level.
I agree with your analysis.
Yes please John, I'll gladly look at the book.
It's incredible the amount of mistakes I was making.
Deleted as per new mindset: it's incredible how much more effective avoiding this will be!
