Strategy 1: Use General I-Statements

Hi everyone! I’m Carol Diane and THIS is Happiness Reclaimed. You were born for the pursuit of happiness which means rising toward your potential mentally, physically, and spiritually, living a life of love with deep meaning and purpose. We’re leaving behind the emotional stress, bad health, and empty spirituality of today, to practice powerful life strategies in a mind-body-spirit approach to wellness. It’s time to reclaim your life. Let’s go.

Today we’re covering Powerful Life Strategy #1

Our first 3 strategies alone might be enough to revolutionize your life. If you actually do USE them I think it’s likely you’ll improve all your relationships—your partner, your friends, your kids, coworkers, boss—every kind of relationship can benefit from these strategies. And that in turn could give you greater success, lower your stress, improve your health and just generally make life a whole lot more fun.

But that said, please remember that everything I say is for educational purposes only and at no time am I ever telling you what to do in a specific situation. So your participation in any way with the Happiness Reclaimed organization signifies your understanding of, and agreement with, these terms.

So with that out of the way, let’s talk about our first strategy.

At first, in the Mind portion of the Mind-Body-Spirit approach to wellness we’re going to talk a lot about communication, meaning the interaction between two people, or in a group of people, but I want you to know that we’re also simultaneously going deeper than that, because these communication strategies have the power to start healing your own emotional health and the emotional health of the people around you.

In fact, I should tell you that I’m covering this one first not because it’s the most powerful. Not because it’s the best. But because it’s simple and manageable and it can start transforming how you feel about yourself. I know when I started to use this technique, I felt like I was actually healing my own psychological wounds.

Now, I said it’s simple but that doesn’t mean it’ll always be easy. To me the word “simple” just means NOT composed of complex parts. But even a simple technique can be difficult in those really difficult conversations. You know the ones I mean?

So what we can do is we can learn these strategies and start practicing them in EASY situations, and then once you have some success and your confidence is up, then you can take your new technique into a more difficult situation IF you feel ready and IF you think it’s the wise thing to do.

So here we go: the first powerful life strategy, which happens to be a communication technique is Use General I-Statements.

Now some of you may have already heard of I-statements and maybe you’re thinking, “Really? You call that powerful?” Oh, yeah, because check out these 4 payoffs or benefits of I-statements. Payoff #1: We get to gradually eliminate a lot of senseless arguing, and that can lower our stress level.

Payoff #2: If we reduce the senseless arguing, we have a better shot at happier relationships. Payoff #3: We’ll also have more influence, more persuasive power. What will you change in your life when you have more persuasive power?

Payoff #4: We’ll boost our psychological wellbeing and self-respect. We can feel better about ourselves, less victimized, less depressed and frustrated with our lives.

Sound good?

So we’re talking general I statements. Let’s start by looking at what I-statements are and set the word “general” off to the side for a little while.

An I-statement begins with “I think,” “I believe,” “I feel,” “In my opinion” “I suggest” “From what I’ve read,” “What I heard is,” The way I was taught,” “Based on my experience I’d say,” and so on.

Here are a few examples:

I think one of the best ways to reduce poverty is through job training.

I believe we have inalienable rights in this country.

I feel so happy about your good news.

I feel hurt.

What I heard is that it isn’t the cholesterol in food that hurts us; it’s more about the sugar causing inflammation.

The way I was taught we should be kind to everyone, even as we’re standing our ground.

Now I want to repeat two of these so that you can hear a critical difference:

Instead of saying “One of the best ways to reduce poverty is through job training,” which kind of sets us up as some kind of expert, and chances are we’re not an expert on very many topics, right? So instead of that general statement of opinion as though we’re the expert and we know it all, we’re just stepping back into a slightly more humble position to say, “I think one of the best ways to reduce poverty is through job training.”

Second example: We could say, “It isn’t the cholesterol in food that hurts us; it’s more about the sugar causing inflammation.”

But that puts us in the position of expert. And if we’re so sure we’re right, then we must be the scientist who has looked at all the research and we also must be sure that future research won’t disprove that theory. Any good scientist knows from experience they need to speak very humbly about what is currently believed to be true, because research can be accidentally flawed, or purposely biased, and scientific theories are often discarded as scientists learn more and more over the years. So to make a statement of fact as though we have an absolute lock on the truth is something we should all be wary of, IMO. So instead, we say,

“What I heard is that it isn’t the cholesterol in food that hurts us; it’s more about the sugar causing inflammation.”

So do you see how we’re automatically going to start eliminating a lot of senseless arguing? Chances are, no one in this room, this imaginary room where this hypothetical conversation is taking place, chances are no one is a true expert, and even if they were, they would be enough of a scientist to be a little humble about making statements of fact like they’re God and they have an absolute lock on truth. So since none of us in this room is really an expert with an absolute lock on truth, why are we talking like we are? Why not just be more accurate by using an i-statement? I think, I feel, What I heard is, The way I was taught, and so on.

What I’m suggesting is that these God-like statements from on high, as though people have a lock on absolute truth, create a lot of arguing, and if you asked them most people would say they don’t even intend to come across that way, so stepping down into an I-statement quickly and easily solves that problem.

Now here’s an extremely important point. I guess we could call this Sub-Point #1.

When you use these wordings you’ll want to use them with a calm and sometimes even cheerful tone if cheerfulness is appropriate. If you’re saying something like “I feel hurt,” then obviously cheerfulness is not appropriate and you’d have a concerned or sad tone, right? But I’d encourage you to develop your self-control and your acting skills if necessary and convey an outer calm to the extent that you can. If you listen to or read a lot of my other material, you’ll know I normally advocate authenticity, but we’re trying to grow ourselves from a weaker or more negative trait to a stronger, more helpful trait. Sometimes using some self-control and some acting skills can help us bridge that gap and practice getting to where we want to go, which is that place of mental strength and inner peace.

Now, if you’re in an extremely difficult conversation with someone, try, try, try to avoid an angry tone. I know from my own experience it’s really, really hard to avoid sometimes, and there are times when we have every right to be super upset, but try to avoid an angry tone as much as humanly possible and opt for a sad one instead. Why? Two reasons: #1 you’re actually being more authentic believe it or not. Anger is a secondary emotion, from what I’ve heard, and the initial emotion is sadness or pain or hurt or fear or something like that. So it’s actually more authentic to feel and express the initial feeling rather than switching to the secondary emotion of anger. I can’t say for sure, but I think it’s possible that the instantaneous unconscious thought in our brains is, “Oh, I don’t want to be vulnerable and show my pain so I’ll switch to anger to try to gain more power and control.”

But that leads us to Reason #2 which is that generally speaking, we’re actually losing power when we descend into anger. I’m not saying there’s never a time for anger because I believe there’s a right time for all God-given emotions, but more often than not, you’ll be coming from a more powerful position if you can remain calm.

Now I realize that most people think they GAIN power by getting angry, but from a healthier, more enlightened view, we can maybe start to see how we’re weak when we’re resorting to anger.

I started out as a high school teacher and that was one of the first bits of advice I heard right up front. They told me, “If you end up yelling, you’ve already lost the battle.”And that lesson has stuck with me, though I can’t say I’ve always won that battle in my personal life. Far from it! I used to be in a situation where I took mistreatment. I took it and took it and took it, and I finally blew up not only into anger but even at times rage. But I believe, first of all, we all need to learn to see ourselves as God sees us. He sees what we went through. He forgives our weakness and our mistakes, so it’s okay. There is no value in continually beating ourselves up over past weaknesses or past mistakes. We all make mistakes. We’re all human. So forgive yourself for past failings, and in the future, just keep telling yourself, “Stay calm, stay calm.”

Now if you’re not feeling calm on the inside, that’s okay. Accept your feelings as they are and simply observe them but tell yourself, “I understand this person I’m talking to may be difficult. I understand my buttons are being pushed. But that is my issue, my battle for control of myself, and I will eventually win that battle. In the meantime, I’ll do my best to show a calm, composed exterior.”

So to sum up that point, try your best to stay calm and possibly even cheerful if cheerful is appropriate for that situation.

Now let’s move to Sub-Point #2.

When we use I-statements, we’re establishing healthy boundaries: we’re speaking only for ourselves, and we allow others to do the same.

As I said earlier, that means we’re stepping down from talking like we know everything. And nobody likes a know-it-all, right? But this is also a matter of healthy boundaries because we’re giving up the need to control others’ opinions. We’re simply minding our own business, which we have a right to do, saying, “I think. This is my opinion.” Speaking only for ourselves.

And Sub-Point #3, even better, from a deep psychological perspective, we’re taking ownership of the way we feel, which possibly could be our issue and our issue alone. If we’re saying “I feel hurt,” maybe the other person is not doing anything wrong. It is theoretically possible and I’ll explain that more near the end of the broadcast.

Now for some people, the transition to this more open-minded and humble approach of just speaking for ourselves, might feel like a terrifying loss of power. Some people might feel like they’re relinquishing control because they’re stepping down from dictating this is how it is, and stepping down into only saying, “I think this is how it is.” But they need to realize they’re really only relinquishing the attempt at control. They don’t usually have control. So they might want to ask themselves, What is my ATTEMPT to control costing me? Is it helping to destroy this relationship?

And is it possible that if I relinquish control, I’m actually going to gain more respect and influence?

So I’m suggesting this change in communication style does not give you less power. It actually give you more because look at the 4 amazingly powerful realities that we’re now going to step into—

Powerful Reality #1: My opinion matters and is worth hearing all by itself. When we “step down” from making a general statement of fact, “This is how it is,” and instead we transition to using the “I think” at the beginning, we are simultaneously elevating the importance of our opinion. You don’t have to be some kind of expert to be worth hearing. You just have to be you. That is the most fundamental idea this nation was founded upon. You as an individual are worthy of respect. You have a right to form an opinion that is different from others. It’s called freedom. So Powerful Reality #1 is, you’re not losing power. You’re reclaiming your freedom and your individual dignity.

Do you realize what a transformative idea that is for really all of us but especially those of us who grew up in families that didn’t want us to have a different opinion? If that’s the case for you, as it was for me, then using I-statements becomes your own form of healing psychotherapy, you might say, a form of re-programming your brain.

Because every time we use an I-statement it’s like we’re announcing to the world AND BEST OFALLTO OURSELVES that we matter. Our opinion matters. And one of the best ways to change your negative beliefs about yourself, is to start acting out the opposite belief. So when you use I-statements you are acting out the truth that your opinion matters.

“Acting as if” is well known in the field of psychology for its tremendous power to help you reach your goals. It’s a way of using behavior to shape thoughts and feelings, to form habits in the brain, to gradually desensitize yourself against whatever is causing you discomfort. As you continue to act as if you’re calm, or act as if you’re confident, you can gradually gain confidence from all the practice you’re getting, so you will eventually replace that discomfort or fear with relaxation and confidence as the behavior becomes more familiar to your brain.

So when you use I-statements you areACTINGAS IF you are a person of value and your opinion matters even if you don’t yet believe that, even if you’ve been beaten down and devalued by other people, even if you feel nervous trying to speak up, your decision to start speaking up means you are now living out this new reality. It may take a while for your feelings and self-confidence to catch up, but you’ll find it gets easier as time goes by.

Now, if you’re with super toxic people, it may be best just to stay away. Remember my disclaimer at the beginning. Only YOU can assess the situation you’re dealing with.

But with that said, for most of us, in most ordinary situations, I think our only risk is irritating a cranky friend, relative or coworker who’s used to dominating everyone, and that’s where sticking to our cheerful calm pays big dividends.

So once again, our first powerful new reality is our opinion matters. From a psychological perspective getting that into our heads is huge.

Powerful Reality #2: Our second powerful reality is that we’re strong enough to learn from different opinions. We’re not so weak that we need to control others, force them to agree with us, or silence them. We’re strong. We’re not afraid of hearing why they might disagree. In fact, get this—we realize their concerns are the key to any true solution. How’s that for a mind-blower! Their different perspective helps us avoid the pitfalls we can’t see.

So our survival at all levels—the personal relationship level, the workplace environment, the community we belong to, the state we live in, the entire nation—depends on putting our heads together and working out the best solution with the fewest negative consequences.

This beneficial collaboration is called “synergy” in some circles. I don’t care what we call it, but I believe without it divorce is more likely, business failure is more likely, social problems are more likely to remain unsolved, and so on. So I‘m hoping that we can all learn synergy—which is this open-minded collaboration where we actually value the opinions of those who think differently.

Synergy doesn’t just eliminate arguing. It opens up a whole new exciting world where problems can be solved creatively. So Reality #2 is we’re strong enough to learn from different opinions.

Powerful Reality #3: The third powerful reality may be the most revolutionary and liberating of all. We’re brave enough to take responsibility for our feelings and even our possible mistakes. So if we’re saying “I feel hurt,” for example, rather than immediately jumping to a YOU statement where we’re blaming the other person for doing bad things, instead what we’re doing with our I-statement is we’re ditching the automatic blame game. We’re going to look for the complete story as to why we’re feeling the way we’re feeling, and we’re courageously committed to the truth no matter where it might lead. And the truth might be there’s a mixture of causes for how we feel. It could be partly the other person’s bad behavior, it could be 100%, but we might also be reacting because of our own sensitivities, our own past history, maybe our own past trauma, and a lot of those things have nothing to do with the person we’re talking to right now.

So Powerful Reality #3 is we’re opening our minds to the possibility that there could be many causes for why we’re feeling the way we feel at this moment. And that person in front of us might be only part of the story, so we’re going to be open-minded to take responsibility for our feelings and simply say, “I feel fill in the blank.” I feel sad. I feel disrespected. I feel like I’m being mocked. I feel hurt. And if part of the problem is even a mistake or a fault within us, then we’ve just struck gold if we can figure that out rather than mistakenly seeing the other person as 100% the cause of the problem.

When you’re actually eager to learn about any possible mistakes you might be making, or flaws in how you’re seeing the world, then no one can touch you. By that I mean you’re not easily hurt by criticism from others. You actually WELCOME learning about your own flaws and your own contribution to the problem. That’s actually good news because that’s something you can work on fixing. It’s much easier to fix yourself than it is to try to fix other people, right?

So this new attitude of “You know I actually welcome any awareness that comes to me that suggests I’ m part of the problem, I am helping to create my upset feelings somehow, because now I am less vulnerable, less easily devastated by the truth, which is that I’m helping to create a problem!”

So this new desire to learn the full truth not only helps you get to a real solution, but it feels like a protective shield around you and things just don’t hurt you the way they used to. We are strong enough to handle the truth and now we have this great sense of freedom because we don’t fear the truth. The truth gets you to real solutions.

I know all this is vague and philosophical so let’s look at some examples.

If we say, “I’m not feeling valued in this relationship,” we are owning that as our feeling. We can choose to be temporarily open-minded as to why we feel that way. We can choose not to blame the other person at this moment. It’s possible the other person’s behavior is 100% the problem, but we’re also open to other factors including our own contribution.

For example, maybe some past wounds within us are also contributing to our painful feelings.

Theoretically it could even be 100% our issue if we’re struggling with severe insecurity.

And it’s hard to be objective about ourselves, so in this precise moment, all we know for sure is “This is how I’m feeling.”

That is actually a very strong position to take, because no one can legitimately argue with you. You feel the way you feel and you alone know how you feel and no one can legitimately tell you that you don’t feel a certain way.

Now in the beginning when you’re dealing with people who have not become savvy to this new way of communicating, they may try to argue with you because they’re still hearing blame. So you’ll need to educate them.

You can say, “I’m not blaming you right now. I’m telling you this is how I’m feeling and that’s all. I’m trying to figure this out.”

For those of you who like to practice mindfulness, this is your PhD-level mindfulness. You’re mindfully observing your own feelings and relationships! You’re not rushing to blame others! You’re simply observing and saying, “Huh. Let’s figure this out. This is how I’m feeling right now. I wonder what that’s about.” You’re becoming curious about yourself!

Here’s an even more common example where we can avoid blame: Instead of saying, “You misunderstood my point,” which is sort of pointing the finger of blame, once we realize the other person is not understanding, we can say, “Oh, I think I’m not being clear. What I’m trying to say is….”

Notice the I-statements. I think I’m not being clear. What I’m trying to say is….

And that is NOT dishonest manipulation because generally speaking our job is to communicate until the other people understand us, and if they didn’t get it the first time, then maybe we need to try another way of saying it.

How about this example? Instead of, “You’re not listening to me!” which sounds like blame and tends to generate the “Yes I AM listening” argument, how about if we say, “I don’t feel listened to right now.”

We’re pulling back into our position of strength and the next question in the mind of the other person should be, “What can I do to help you feel listened to?” It’s a subtle difference, and again, you’ll have to take time and work to re-educate people so they understand how this new interaction works.

That means it’ll take them a while to stop hearing blame and it’ll take them time to learn to trust you that you really are just trying to figure everything out with more of a neutral mind and heart.

But if you sincerely stick with it, they may eventually realize that you are now open-minded and curious and you’ve dropped the automatic blame game, so they can then stop reacting so defensively.

Family systems therapy tells us that if one person changes the dynamic, the rest of the system has to change somehow. Eventually. So there are no guarantees when it comes to human beings, but our hope is they’ll learn to ditch the blame game also.

IMO, there are very few things more hate-provoking than a blame game going back and forth.

“You’re the bad guy and I’m 100% the perfect innocent victim!”

“No, I’m not the bad guy! You’re the bad guy!”

If you‘ve been in a relationship with someone who is frequently shifting blame onto you, you probably know what I mean.

I bet I know what you’re thinking. Yes, it’s a lot of work to change deeply entrenched dynamics when you already have years of negative history but it can be done. Especially if both people are open to taking a more objective look at the interaction from up above, a more detached view of the feelings and the dynamics.

So, Reality #3 is we’re brave enough to own our feelings and also our possible mistakes. We’re ditching the automatic blame game.

And finally, the 4th powerful reality is that when we use I-statements we give up being the defeated, powerless victim. Because we have ditched the blame game, we can now be invigorated with new hope for the future.

Watch how this works:

“You can’t talk to them!” becomes “So far, I’ve found it difficult to talk to them.”

It could be they really are stubborn and bull-headed and maybe it is impossible. Or maybe I just haven’t used a skillful approach yet. Or it could be I’m saddled with feelings of fear and inadequacy that stem from my childhood so I subconsciously see everyone as powerful and immovable and impossible. It could be I just haven’t give it enough time. It could be a combination of all 4 of those factors or other factors.

Because I’m not God and I can’t know perfectly all the factors involved and their exact percentages, I’ll just withhold my judgment for a while, and I’ll own the struggle as mine: “So far, I’ve found it difficult to talk to them.”

So now, rather than being this hopeless victim, I’m ready to do more analysis and figure out what could work and what’s going on within my own mind.

I’m not accepting defeat. I’m simply saying what’s true: “So far I have found it difficult.”

Do you see how you’re helping to destroy your own defeat and your own hopeless depression?

Here are more examples:

“Parents don’t really care!”

This person is making this global statement about all parents. Are they suggesting they’re an expert on all parents? No, of course they’re not, and I think if they can calm down and get curious about their own inner feelings, they’ll come to realize they’re really just expressing their sadness or disillusionment and their hurt, and our hearts go out to them. We can be empathic or empathetic or sympathetic and understand their pain, so let’s change to an I-statement, which is really more accurate for what’s more precisely in this person’s mind and heart.

So the statement becomes, “I’ve often felt my parents don’t try to understand what I’m going through.”

So do you see what just happened psychologically? Not only did we switch away from a very global doom-and-gloom hopeless statement about all parents, which would probably add to our depression, but we also became more specific about what the parents are doing wrong.

The more specific we can be, the more we have a chance of accomplishing change.

And we also changed from a statement that sounded like we were saying this is ALWAYS true, to one where we use the word “often.” “I’ve often felt my parents don’t try to understand what I’m going through.”

So the problem just became more manageable in our minds because we’re acknowledging that this is “often” a problem, but not ALWAYS a problem. “Often” is still a bad situation that ideally should be fixed, but at least it’s less grim and depressing than always, always, always.

Do you see how we’re changing our own view of the world and eliminating some of our hopeless depression simply by being more precise in our statements and using I-statements?

Here’s another example:

“My boss is a bully” becomes “I feel disrespected by my boss.”

So now we have a more specific description of the problem and we’re focusing more on the people we have the most control of—ourselves! Now we can explore possible solutions. But if I see myself as standing before this impossible bully, then I’m constructing in my mind a hopeless reality.

Do you see how, when we stop blaming and take back our power with I-statements, the future looks brighter?

So once again, here are the 4 new powerful realities developing from our I-statements:

1. Our opinion matters

2. We’re strong enough to learn from different opinions

3. We’re brave enough to own our feelings and possible mistakes

4. We’re not defeated, powerless victims

So let me ask you: how would your life change if you started operating in these new realities?

And how would political discussion go better?

So that’s your I-statement. Now, what about the word “general”? We also want to be understood as saying “generally speaking,” unless we explicitly say something to the contrary such as, “I think it’sALWAYS the case that…” or “I think about TEN PERCENT of the time, such-n-such is true.”

Now here’s what I want you to start noticing.

In a discussion, people usually mean their statements as general I-statements. But their comments don’t come out that way. They don’t bother to use the phrase “I think” so they sound like they’re making an absolute statement of fact, and the listeners tend to think the word “always” is there. In other words, the statement sounds like the person is saying that XYZ is always true. This causes the listeners to want to argue with what sounds like a false statement because they know the statement is NOT always true.

So to avoid that problem we can all agree to start forming a habit of general I-statements. That means we can use phrases like “generally speaking,” “usually,” “oftentimes” and so on.

We also agree to be reasonable about how often we expect others to use I-statements. In lengthy comments that you might make and in my broadcasts, we understand the whole thing is opinion, right?

What I’m sharing is my professional and personal opinion about what’s helpful for you to know.

So especially in teaching or any lengthy communication, it’s not practical to start every sentence with “I think…I think…In my opinion…I think.” That would sound ridiculous!

But let’s all agree that’s how our statements should be received. And we’ll work hard to use general I-statements sprinkled throughout our comments.

So here’s an example of a general I-statement:

“I think generally speaking parents are deeply concerned about their children’s welfare.”

Do you agree or disagree? In the next broadcast, we’ll learn how to respond and that will bring us to Powerful Life Strategy #2.

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If you have any questions at all, please contact me at HappinessReclaimed.com. I’ll try to answer those questions in a future broadcast.