Quote from John Freeman on October 24, 2023, 10:14 am

Another success: the manipulative resident is gone! I told good bye to her yesterday. I even gifted her chocolate and thanked her (did the same to the other residents who left): so olive branch.

I think she now really respects me: I gave her encouragement and she was very happy. So part of it might also be her youth.

Anyway it does not matter: she's gone. I learned from her how to defend against people like her. So it's a good thing.

Quote from John Freeman on October 24, 2023, 10:14 pm

PS: she also did differently that what I told her to do on a case. I hesitated to send her an email and then to my bosses. But I let it go. It's her character: she thinks she knows better than 10 years experience orthopedists and radiologists for instance. And she has 1 year of experience in pediatrics. So she's full of ego and now she's gone. I'm not going to let my ego get in the way. Strategically it's better not to make a bad case out of it now that we had a better relationship. It's in the past now.

Also to my bosses, they will think I have something personally against her and it's going to sound bad for me.

What I learned is that my bosses don't want to hear that the residents are problematic. They want to hear that everything is fine.

They're not much into the development of residents. They will teach them yes, but they're not committed to their personal growth. So the less problems the better.

 

Quote from John Freeman on October 25, 2023, 7:25 am

This morning I understand something else. The pediatrics service want to improve their reputation and recruit attending and residents.

They have a recruitment and reputation issue.

So now I understand that if residents are not criticized then they will feel good about themselves. Therefore they will speak well about the service and are potential future attendings once they advance.

That’s just speculation. But that is what is more sound in terms of strategy and gains than not caring about their progress. By being nice they probably hope to improve their reputation. Speculations.

What they’re missing is that residents actually respond better to being challenged and then congratulated when they improve/succeed. And the hospital will definitely improve its reputation when the hospital where they go next will see that residents from our hospitals are well trained.

Another hypothesis (the most likely) is that they have other priorities at their level. But if that’s the case it’s a mistake in my opinion.

Anyway I came here to say that my next priority in self-development is to work on approval seeking (thanks to Lucio I understood it). It’s something that I’ve been procrastinating on. I also hoped it would fix itself as I worked on self-esteem. It did not enough in my tastes. It's a fundamental as it relates to everything else. So it’s boring not sexy self development but high ROI. Like self-esteem.

It’s a cognitive and behavioral pattern that must be targeted specifically to see results.

Quote from John Freeman on October 25, 2023, 11:15 am

About this:

Quote from John Freeman on October 24, 2023, 10:14 pm

PS: she also did differently that what I told her to do on a case. I hesitated to send her an email and then to my bosses. But I let it go. It's her character: she thinks she knows better than 10 years experience orthopedists and radiologists for instance. And she has 1 year of experience in pediatrics. So she's full of ego and now she's gone. I'm not going to let my ego get in the way. Strategically it's better not to make a bad case out of it now that we had a better relationship. It's in the past now.

I think in this case it's better to swallow my pride and let it slide. 2 other options:

1. Tell her face to face but I won't be seeing her before I leave so not an option
2. Send her an email: but it's been a few days and it's not optimal with email. It will look like I took it personally (which I did).

If you guys have a different opinion, I'm curious to hear it.

 

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on October 25, 2023, 8:25 pm

Quote from John Freeman on October 24, 2023, 10:14 pm

PS: she also did differently that what I told her to do on a case. I hesitated to send her an email and then to my bosses. But I let it go. It's her character: she thinks she knows better than 10 years experience orthopedists and radiologists for instance. And she has 1 year of experience in pediatrics. So she's full of ego and now she's gone. I'm not going to let my ego get in the way. Strategically it's better not to make a bad case out of it now that we had a better relationship. It's in the past now.

I think in this case it's better to swallow my pride and let it slide. 2 other options:

1. Tell her face to face but I won't be seeing her before I leave so not an option
2. Send her an email: but it's been a few days and it's not optimal with email. It will look like I took it personally (which I did).

If you guys have a different opinion, I'm curious to hear it.

I am on the same page with letting it slide.
Sometimes these people will hang themselves without any "external" intervention.
If her behaviour affects your work or reputation, then maybe a different approach would be called for.

Anyway I came here to say that my next priority in self-development is to work on approval seeking (thanks to Lucio I understood it). It’s something that I’ve been procrastinating on. I also hoped it would fix itself as I worked on self-esteem. It did not enough in my tastes. It's a fundamental as it relates to everything else. So it’s boring not sexy self development but high ROI. Like self-esteem.

I have tried a few things to be less approval seeking:

• Being goal-oriented: I find that being goal-oriented naturally leads to less approval seeking. I have a clear, internal objective to achieve.
• Hanging out with people who consistently appreciate my assertiveness: Hanging out with people who appreciate open and assertive communication help to reinforce the idea that I don't need to seek approval.
• Challenge inner critic: Sometimes we criticize ourselves for having negative emotions. These results in secondary negative emotions like guilt and shame. I used to feel bad about feeling sad. Now I feel sad and am okay with feeling sad. Sometimes my inner critic would say "I shouldn't be feeling sad.". Now I challenge my inner critic by saying "I feel sad, and that's a healthy response to this situation.".
• Describing how I feel about the environment: Helps in emotional assertiveness. It also avoids the risk of too much emotional vulnerability. And it's something that you always have in common with others. I get to express how I feel about the environment, the vibe, the people, etc. For example,

This place feels very relaxing to me.
I like the decorations and how the colors blend together.
It's the type of place I would go to after a stressful day at work.

Quote from John Freeman on October 25, 2023, 9:13 pm

Thank you Matthew!

Thanks to you it inspired me to understand that me seeking approval has a root cause: anxious attachment.

If one has an anxious attachment style he/she will seek approval and please people in order not to be rejected.

I'll answer more later.

Quote from John Freeman on October 25, 2023, 11:27 pm

LIke when I gifted the residents chocolate and thanked them.

That's not what an alpha male would do. An alpha male would be gifted the chocolate and being thanked.

My whole perspective shifted.

Quote from John Freeman on October 26, 2023, 9:18 pm

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on October 25, 2023, 8:25 pm

Quote from John Freeman on October 24, 2023, 10:14 pm

PS: she also did differently that what I told her to do on a case. I hesitated to send her an email and then to my bosses. But I let it go. It's her character: she thinks she knows better than 10 years experience orthopedists and radiologists for instance. And she has 1 year of experience in pediatrics. So she's full of ego and now she's gone. I'm not going to let my ego get in the way. Strategically it's better not to make a bad case out of it now that we had a better relationship. It's in the past now.

I think in this case it's better to swallow my pride and let it slide. 2 other options:

1. Tell her face to face but I won't be seeing her before I leave so not an option
2. Send her an email: but it's been a few days and it's not optimal with email. It will look like I took it personally (which I did).

If you guys have a different opinion, I'm curious to hear it.

I am on the same page with letting it slide.
Sometimes these people will hang themselves without any "external" intervention.
If her behaviour affects your work or reputation, then maybe a different approach would be called for.

Thanks! Yeah I think it's a good metrics. Here no effect on my work nor reputation.

Anyway I came here to say that my next priority in self-development is to work on approval seeking (thanks to Lucio I understood it). It’s something that I’ve been procrastinating on. I also hoped it would fix itself as I worked on self-esteem. It did not enough in my tastes. It's a fundamental as it relates to everything else. So it’s boring not sexy self development but high ROI. Like self-esteem.

I have tried a few things to be less approval seeking:

• Being goal-oriented: I find that being goal-oriented naturally leads to less approval seeking. I have a clear, internal objective to achieve.

Definitely.

• Hanging out with people who consistently appreciate my assertiveness: Hanging out with people who appreciate open and assertive communication help to reinforce the idea that I don't need to seek approval.

Interesting. New idea to me.

• Challenge inner critic: Sometimes we criticize ourselves for having negative emotions. These results in secondary negative emotions like guilt and shame. I used to feel bad about feeling sad. Now I feel sad and am okay with feeling sad. Sometimes my inner critic would say "I shouldn't be feeling sad.". Now I challenge my inner critic by saying "I feel sad, and that's a healthy response to this situation.".

Definitely.

• Describing how I feel about the environment: Helps in emotional assertiveness. It also avoids the risk of too much emotional vulnerability. And it's something that you always have in common with others. I get to express how I feel about the environment, the vibe, the people, etc. For example,

This place feels very relaxing to me.
I like the decorations and how the colors blend together.
It's the type of place I would go to after a stressful day at work.

Interesting, new idea to me.

Thank you very much Matthew for your thoughtful post!

Quote from Matthew Whitewood on October 26, 2023, 9:29 pm

Thanks for your feedback too! I learnt and explored some of these ideas from CBT. So I was thinking of how certain thoughts and behaviors can be challenged and reinforced for more self-acceptance.

Thanks to you it inspired me to understand that me seeking approval has a root cause: anxious attachment.

If one has an anxious attachment style he/she will seek approval and please people in order not to be rejected.

Thanks for sharing. Not sure about your background. I do think we can develop some of these approval-seeking tendencies when we grow up in families where we need to earn acceptance.

I grew up with some of that. Needing to earn acceptance.