How much of who you are is just living out the expectations of others?

How much of who you are is just holding off your fears?

How much of who I am is just a reaction to too many episodes of Most Shocking Police Videos?  (Gotcha.)

 

Back to The Wrestler.  Warning: Plot busters revealed in this post.

Randy the Ram (Mickey Rourke), The Wrestler, is a man who split rather than figure out how to have close relationships with people who were actually close (wife, daughter, friends).  Now, this is not to blame Randy or label him, because he, like the rest of us, came by his defense systems honestly. He reacted to anxiety by avoidance, which is actually a fairly popular method. 

 

And, the Ram had the bad luck of success as a “professional” wrestler.  If the Ram had had a thin build, a lack of discipline, or an allergy to steroids–perhaps he would have turned around, faced the real world, and managed lasting relationships. But, the Ram was good.

 

He fit in great with the other men who practiced their shows and reveled in the artificiality of what they were doing. Randy the Ram was good at fooling people.  The fans screamed for him.  He could hear them begging for him before he entered the ring.  They asked for his autograph.  The wife and the daughter never asked for his autograph.  When he was with his wife and daugter he didn’t know what he was supposed to do, which didn’t feel good at all.

For the Ram, praise became his addiction.  The fake part of him became the only part he valued because it was the only part of him valued by others. The movie begins when Randy the Ram is twenty years past his prime, broke, and broken.  He pathetically comes alive for thirty minutes a week playing small town VFW’s and selling his own memorabilia to marginal fans.

 

Then the Ram has a heart attack and is told by the surgeon who does his bypass that if he does more drugs or wrestles it will kill him.  At first he fights the idea, then he slides into a regular job in a deli, finds out he can deal with customers with humor and fun, and begins to think life as an ordinary (real) person might be possible for him.  He looks up his daughter and has a great afternoon.  Though he has disappointed the daughter all her life, with much effort he convinces her to meet him for dinner the next Saturday.  

The only relationship the Ram has is with a stripper (Marissa Torme) who, like him, survives by faking emotions she doesn’t have. As part of his effort to build a life, the Ram asks the stripper if they might have a real relationship and she rebuffs him.  Without experience or skills to deal with rejection, Randy the Ram loses it, goes on a drinking, drugging, sex with a stranger binge.  He forgets about the ”one last chance date” with his daughter and stands her up one more time.

 

Randy the Ram tries to recover with the daughter, but she’s had enough.  The Ram runs to the one place he feels comfortable like a junkie runs for the needle when times are tough.  The ring.  Under the spotlight, hearing the crowd.  And it kills him.

 

Randy the Ram is a man whose EMOTIONAL GUIDANCE SYSTEM made all his decisions.  

. . . Tomorrow:  The Lawn Mower Fueling Incident . . .  

 

 If you were famous enough to have YOUR OWN ACTION FIGURE would you have Self Confidence and Self Esteem?  More to nail on the Psychobabble Wall of Things that Aren’t True:  If you get enough Praise . . . you will have SELF CONFIDENCE  and SELF ESTEEM. 

But wait!  Praise is a good thing, right? After all, praise makes us FEEL good. We’ve even told parents and teachers that praise (social reinforcement) is the way to get kids to accomplish tasks. We’ve told husbands and wives that praising their spouses can MAKE THEM FEEL LOVED.  Can’t get too much praise, can’t give too much praise . . . right? 

Maybe.  But, What is, “Do these pants make me look fat?”  but one more attempt to suck approval out of another person and duck responsibility for ourselves? (By the way, you regular readers know and have taken the pledge to never, ever, ask anyone that question, or any similar question. You guys remember that any part of your body or personality that you complain about grows to enormous proportions in the eyes of the other.) 

The problem is, if you buy that enough love and praise results in Self Confidence and Self Esteem, it follows then that, if you DO NOT FEEL loaded up with these feathery showstoppers, self-confidence and self-esteem, you must have–somewhere along the line–missed out on sufficient praise.  Now, I wish the worst part of this misguided notion is that we will overblame others (See “What’s Love Got to Do With It?)  . . . but that’s not the worst part.  The most damaging result of this belief is believing –   “I don’t have self confidence and self esteem because I did not get the love and praise I needed AND I did not get the love and praise I needed to be a person with self confidence and self esteem BECAUSE I’M NOT DESERVING OF LOVE and PRAISE”.  And that’s just not right. The whole chase approval, get praise routine is a dead end.  The movie The Wrestler speaks to this issue with clarity, pain, and beauty.   

Warning:  Plot information to follow.  If you haven’t seen The Wrestler and you want to be surprised, stop now. Also, you probably want to avoid the movie if a lot of nudity, a lot, is going to bother you. 

The Wrestler, Randy the Ram (Mickey Rourke), reaches physical maturity to discover he doesn’t know how to participate in adult relationships.  At about the same time he starts spending hours at the gym and learns what body-building enhancing drugs can do for him.  Wha-la!  The Ram is getting noticed.  Being admired.  He even has his own Randy the Ram action toy on the market.

Tomorrow:  Is having an action toy in your image the same as being a real person?

 

 

 

   Which, of course, they are going to be anyway.  But since we’ve given our precious permission, what that means is that we CANNOT be all surprised when they are themselves.

Remember we expected that.  Gave permission.  Later in evolvement we’ll even recognize that others have THE RIGHT to be themselves.  But, not yet.  For now we’re just being generous.

Which means:

The person who cuts in front of you at the grocery store with 80 items, you said she could do that.

The person who’s late to Thanksgiving dinner–you said that would be fine.

You gave the person who doesn’t return your e-mail for four days–you gave permission.

The person who has too much wine at dinner–you gave them permission.

The one who cannot stop talking about the one who had too much wine–you gave her permission.

The one who spends Thanksgiving talking about how diets–you gave her permission.

The one who undercooks an item and the one who burns one–you gave them permission.

The people who’ve had their Christmas lights up since mid-October–you gave them permission.

All those people jamming up the roadways–you gave them permission.

The guy who will whack me in the head as he puts his bag in the overhead on the plane–I hereby GIVE HIM PERMISSION.

Are you getting a feel for HOW ABSOLUTELY FREEING IT IS to turn your focus away from CHANGING OTHERS to MANAGING YOURSELF? 

The Movie Revolt Incident:  It was Friday afternoon after Thanksgiving.  After lunch, a group of six laws and in-laws in my husband’s family decided to go to a popular horror movie.    On the way, one sister-in-law announced she’d drop off the rest of us and come back to pick us up, as she did not want to see this particular movie.  That’s when things began falling apart.  I opted to skip the movie as well.  A third expressed doubts and the pro-movie people started suggesting other movies.

Yikes.  We stopped to buy a paper and look for another movie, though we three rebels were okay without one.  The start time for the horror movie past, one brother-in-law threw up his hands and criticized his wife for not listening to him when he said they should bring the paper with them from home.  I started apologizing for some random thing (and thinking how these family “togetherness” holidays were overrated).  The original “rebel” launched in on a story from childhood when she didn’t sleep for days after a horror movie.      Her husband added that she was “always like this with his family, but anything goes when they are with her family.”

All because one person attempted a INDIVIDUALITY move.

Thinking in terms of natural systems, each of us operates with a TOGETHERNESS force and a INDIVIDUALITY force. 

What?      Think of it like this when you are anxious and find relief calling a friend, your togetherness force was in affect.  If you feel calmer at Thanksgiving when you escape to the back den and the football game, your individuality force is in action. 

Forget the complexity.  In the next several days we will look at ways to manage anxiety when our force for individuality is overwhelmed by the presence of others, each of whom INSISTS ON BEING THEMSELVES instead of only being in ways to MAKE US COMFORTABLE.

Whew.  I’m tired just thinking about it. 

  Thanksgiving.  Wasn’t it about inviting the natives of this country to a feast?  Well, it’s not anymore.  Now it’s about food, family, and football.  And, at least for me, it’s not that easy.

Maybe you’re different, but I find it easier to tell my goals to a stranger on a plane than it is to talk to a family member?  Why?  Because I care too much what a family member says.  What he or she thinks.

Thus I OVER-LISTEN and OVER-REACT. 

I have a picture in my head as to how my SISTER, MOTHER, BROTHER, BROTHER-IN-LAW, should respond to me.  When they do not . . . and they’re always failing me . . . I lose charge of my emotional steadiness.  In fact, as we all know, any problems I have in my life today are because of their failures.  Ask any psychologist. 

THE TRIPLICATE MYTH:  If I my parents and siblings had properly loved me, I would be an all-happy person now–effortlessly. 

If my spouse properly loved me, i would be an all-happy person, now–effortlessly.

If, you, my therapist could properly loved me, I will be an all-happy person–effortlessly.

Oh no.  I just blew my own cover.  This being IN CHARGE of self is going to be really hard if I can’t convince my family, friends, and casual acquaintances to give me the attention and support I MUST HAVE.

Particularly, since unlike me.  They are nuts. 

    The myth of sibling rivalry–the blanket acceptance that the main preoccupation of children is is garnering attention from their parents–doesn’t even make sense.  

Yet it’s one of the simplistic and convenient drawers we use to account for behavior and sometimes to excuse immature relationships into adulthood and throughout our lives.

Now, everyone wants their way, thus sibs fight like other species, and husbands and wives–to get their ways. Nothing wrong with this.  It’s the institutionalized idea and explainations and rationalizations where we get into trouble.    The problem comes in when  WE BELIEVE AND THEREFORE “CREATE A CORRESPONDING WORLD.”

Our freedom to become is reduced when WE RESPOND TO MEMBERS OF OUR FAMILY AS WHO WE THINK THEY ARE, INSTEAD OF WHO THEY ARE.