I challenge my adult clients to focus only on their own behavior and their own thinking.
Many conversations reveal people to be experts in what their significant others will, won’t do, or will or won’t say under a myriad of circumstances then offer a blank stare when asked about their own behaviors. This unhealthy focus on others leads to thinking for others, too.
And, it can all look and sound so loving.
I encourage a shift in discipline – to become an expert in one’s own behavior and to think for oneself or to get out of other people’s heads.
This is not selfish.
Consider how selfish it really is to focus on the behavior of others and to think it is necessary to think for others. Consider how self-aware and considerate it is to monitor our own behavior and to trust others to be capable of thinking for themselves.
Being an expert in another can be annoying.
Thinking for another can be quite amusing.
“You are hungry. You need the loo. You are always so difficult. You must be cold, wear this,” I heard one spouse say to another.
Then she’ll complain he has no life in him.
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