Hi, are you OK?
As today has been fairly uneventful, I will tell you about the book I'm reading ATM. It's called 'I'm OK, You're OK', + is about Transactional Analysis.
TA is based on the idea that each person's psyche can be spilt into Parent, Adult, + Child. These are similar to the Superego, Ego, + Id of Freudian psychology; Child is what you want to do, Parent is what you've been told to do, + Adult is what you choose to do.
As a baby in the womb you operate completely in Child, performing bodily functions + wriggling whenever you like, with no external influences. Almost as soon as you pop out, you begin to take in your surroundings + be influenced by the actions of others towards you, eg. your mother cuddles you to stop you crying, + shouts at you or ignores you if you do something wrong. The things you are taught in the first few years of life become your inner Parent, strong beliefs that do not always have basis in fact, but are used to control your own behaviour + the way you veiw + try to control other people. In your Child are your emotions, as you felt + expressed them before you had adequate language + social skills to do so in a rational way.
As a small child, you spend your life surrounded by people who are much bigger + cleverer + more able to do everything than you are. Even if your family are especially happy + loving, you come to feel that others are 'better' than you - a position called 'I'm not OK, you're OK.' In later life, if at any time you feel that you are 'not OK' the Child part of your personality will come to the fore. When you get your taste of power over others (eg. when you are left to play with a younger child or pet) you make up for your feelings of being 'Not OK' by behaving in a Parental way towards your minions, so you feel that you are OK + they are Not OK. Whether this is more nuturing or punishing depends on how adults in your life have treated you, because it's from this that you learn how to be in charge.
As you get older + start making descisions + discoveries for yourself, your Adult develops. The Adult takes in information from all availiable sources, including the parent + child, + makes independant choices in the hope of acheiving the best outcome.
Sometimes, people who had unstable or abusive childhoods switch off either their parent, adult, or child. Everyone else uses all three states at times, depending on how the feel about themselves + others around them, but hardly anyone uses them all equally. You can flip from one to the other instantaneously, + any of your three states can talk to any of someone else's three states, + you will understand each other as long as you recognize + accept the postion the other person is in. As I was reading the book I thought I was mostly in Adult; but having followed myself around + evaluated my thoughts over a few days, I've realized I'm actually more Parent than anything else. Although I'd never tell someone what to do or praise/criticize them openly, I'm often doing it subversively in my head or to someone else. I'm very quick to offer advice or support to someone asking for help, but not so willing to take it myself. By + large, I consider myself more OK than the average man in the street.
Which, come to think of it, is proven by the fact I've wrote this entry. The underlying message is more or less 'Look, children; here is something I know that you might find interesting. Let me educate you.' I could have just described what I'd done today + what I thought (Adult - direct, agendaless communication) Or complained that everyone at work was being horrible to me + It's boring + I don't want to go any more (Child - not in control of surroundings, seeking comfort.) But I chose not to.
QOTD:
'I have niced that when some asks for you on the telephone +, finding you out, leaves a message begging you to call him up the moment you come in as it's important, the matter is more often important to him than to you.'
~W. Somerset Maugham (In Parent)
TA is based on the idea that each person's psyche can be spilt into Parent, Adult, + Child. These are similar to the Superego, Ego, + Id of Freudian psychology; Child is what you want to do, Parent is what you've been told to do, + Adult is what you choose to do.
As a baby in the womb you operate completely in Child, performing bodily functions + wriggling whenever you like, with no external influences. Almost as soon as you pop out, you begin to take in your surroundings + be influenced by the actions of others towards you, eg. your mother cuddles you to stop you crying, + shouts at you or ignores you if you do something wrong. The things you are taught in the first few years of life become your inner Parent, strong beliefs that do not always have basis in fact, but are used to control your own behaviour + the way you veiw + try to control other people. In your Child are your emotions, as you felt + expressed them before you had adequate language + social skills to do so in a rational way.
As a small child, you spend your life surrounded by people who are much bigger + cleverer + more able to do everything than you are. Even if your family are especially happy + loving, you come to feel that others are 'better' than you - a position called 'I'm not OK, you're OK.' In later life, if at any time you feel that you are 'not OK' the Child part of your personality will come to the fore. When you get your taste of power over others (eg. when you are left to play with a younger child or pet) you make up for your feelings of being 'Not OK' by behaving in a Parental way towards your minions, so you feel that you are OK + they are Not OK. Whether this is more nuturing or punishing depends on how adults in your life have treated you, because it's from this that you learn how to be in charge.
As you get older + start making descisions + discoveries for yourself, your Adult develops. The Adult takes in information from all availiable sources, including the parent + child, + makes independant choices in the hope of acheiving the best outcome.
Sometimes, people who had unstable or abusive childhoods switch off either their parent, adult, or child. Everyone else uses all three states at times, depending on how the feel about themselves + others around them, but hardly anyone uses them all equally. You can flip from one to the other instantaneously, + any of your three states can talk to any of someone else's three states, + you will understand each other as long as you recognize + accept the postion the other person is in. As I was reading the book I thought I was mostly in Adult; but having followed myself around + evaluated my thoughts over a few days, I've realized I'm actually more Parent than anything else. Although I'd never tell someone what to do or praise/criticize them openly, I'm often doing it subversively in my head or to someone else. I'm very quick to offer advice or support to someone asking for help, but not so willing to take it myself. By + large, I consider myself more OK than the average man in the street.
Which, come to think of it, is proven by the fact I've wrote this entry. The underlying message is more or less 'Look, children; here is something I know that you might find interesting. Let me educate you.' I could have just described what I'd done today + what I thought (Adult - direct, agendaless communication) Or complained that everyone at work was being horrible to me + It's boring + I don't want to go any more (Child - not in control of surroundings, seeking comfort.) But I chose not to.
QOTD:
'I have niced that when some asks for you on the telephone +, finding you out, leaves a message begging you to call him up the moment you come in as it's important, the matter is more often important to him than to you.'
~W. Somerset Maugham (In Parent)