“Die Hard is is most certainly held in the collective unconscious as a Christmas film and those who deny it are bound to work through and abreact grievances via the Oedipal triangle...”
-C.G. Jung
Ok, so that’s not actually Jung, but he would have certainly said something to that effect (right?...). In either case, statements like this may capture the overall mood of being stuck amongst challenging company at Christmas time in that, opinions can get heated, facts and context can go out the window and any dissent to edicts of this nature stoke dormant ire.
Transactional Analysis
As I have said before, we cannot change others or the outer world, but we can park the vicissitudes of the external and take agency in ourselves, another way to do this is through a field of psychology called ‘Transactional Analysis’. In this theory (of Eric Berne) this essentially recognises that any person at any given time or context may be interacting with another in one of three ‘ego states’; child, parent and adults. This may come up in the test so here’s a reminder we benefit from trying be Adults about this....
Ego states
Think of an example scenario of someone from your family of origin asking you if you’ll spend Christmas with them as opposed to your friends or partners family. Regardless of what state the other person is in we have three broad channels to respond via;
1) Child state (C): behaviours, thoughts, feelings and responses are drawn from your childhood self.
2) Parent state (P): Behaviours, thoughts, feelings and responses are modelled from parent figures or authority from a younger time when we were less able to appraise and were more impressionable.
3) Adult state (A): behaviours, thoughts, feelings and responses are based firmly in the here and now, thoughts are conscious and rational. This reflects your autonomy and freedom as an adult to choose and to sat no.
Here’s some visuals with how these three states may play out;
Child State
Parent State
Adult to Adult state
Complimentary & Crossed Transactions
As well as considering the three ego states you may occupy given any different interaction, if you try being #CuriousNotCritical you can notice the ego states of others and not fall into the trap of what’s called ‘complimentary’ transactions (hint: complimentary doesn’t mean nice always!).
E.g. you respond to another being the irritable adult by acting as the apologising child or you are really irritated and decide to berate another who is seemingly behaving as a younger version of themselves. Additionally, you may find yourself in a ‘crossed transaction’ where on party is in the Adult state and the other is either in child or parent (and vice versa).
What we need is Adult to Adult communication, that is our needs, feelings and boundaries clearly and assertively expressed in the knowledge both parties cannot make another do or feel a certain way but only tend to their own world. A good clue to notice if you or another is not operating in an adult state is any strong emotions, powerful trains of thought or noticeable somatic reactions, in that case I always invite people to catch a few slow diaphragmatic breaths to help the brain to it’s thing and for your to get a moment to get a sense of the situation.
Look after yourself in it and be sound to you!
Here’s Berne’s core text and some easy listens on the subject
-Bern, E. (1964). Games People Play. Penguin Books.
-Blindboy Boatclub (2018). Creaking Ditch Pigeon. https://open.spotify.com/episode/5si6DkeDBbnEsWg7cWMlS0?si=82ce68879e654cbd
-Corporate Beyond Stories (2020)https://open.spotify.com/episode/6YwLNhfDbrKDkvnWuOviVg?si=b663b7369c844ce4
#lyrictherapy #transactionalanalysis #unconsciousthoughts #triggered #emotionalintelligence #CBT #cognitivebehaviouraltherapy #counselling #psychotherapy #southwilliamstreet #Dublin #familyoforigin #christmassurvivalguide
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