What I find helpful (when I remember), is to imagine that the person who is seemingly blaming or criticising is like a pressure cooker, that has reached boiling point and has to let the steam out or else it will explode. I haven’t met anybody yet that would feel blamed or criticised by the steam that is coming out of the pressure cooker. It is a good thing that the valve is working properly and letting the steam out. If it wasn’t working properly, the results would be messy and dangerous. The steam is alerting us of the heat and pressure inside the cooker. It is an innocent messenger. In a similar manner, if we feel like saying (or if we blurt out) words that amount to blame or criticism, those words are letting us and others know that there is an unmet need or that we have betrayed ourselves and gone beyond our values or boundaries or simply that we have reached boiling point emotionally! If we are at the receiving end, our partners may be unable to identify ‘what is cooking’ in...
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