Children don’t listen to their parents, but they never fail to imitate them.

I recently spoke with Regina Pally, M.D., Co-Founder and Assistant Director of the Center for Reflective Parenting about how and where children learn to do what they do and beyond that to where they get their sense of security or insecurity.

Goulston: Regina, how and where do kids learn to do what they do?

Pally: Childhood is so much about learning. Kid’s brains are literally sponges for soaking up new information. But HOW they learn can often surprise and frustrate parents. Kids are phenomenal imitators. They are keen observers of what people are doing, and they are excellent at copying it. And in fact it turns out children learn much more by imitation than they do by instruction.

The easiest example of this that people can relate to is learning how to speak. Kids just pick it up. You don’t have to teach them vocabulary or grammar; They just absorb by imitation, the language they are exposed to.

So when it comes to learning other behaviors it is not much different. As imitators they are more likely to do what they observe than what they are taught. When parents say do what I say not what I do, it is a recipe for failure. Because kids do what the adults around them do, particularly their parents. It is a kind of osmosis so to speak, in which they soak in and internalize what others they care about are doing.

 This is the main way they learn how it is they are supposed “be” in the world- what the rules are at home, and at school, how they are supposed to get along with other people, and also how they are supposed to control their behaviors and how they are supposed to control and express their feelings, and even things like how they are supposed to work hard for what they want.

Goulston: So telling your kids what to do is not as effective as many parents would hope?

Pally: Parents should keep in mind its more ‘Do what I Do’, and less ‘do what I say’. And when I say Do, what I mean is how parents behave toward their child as well as with other people. Do they get easily frustrated with their child and impulsively lash out with hostility. Are they patient and listen carefully to what their child is feeling? Do they impose their power over the child or do they allow the child some autonomy in making decisions.

As much as parents wish they could teach kids how to behave simply by instruction….’Now listen to me young man, you can’t just go around the house yelling you have to think about other people in this house too.’…more often than not they will be more successful in getting their children to learn these important lessons by how they behave themselves.

Goulston: Can you give some specific examples?

Pally: If Dad does a lot of yelling himself, and gets easily frustrated when he does not get his way, it’s no surprise if his child acts that way. If Mom gets hyper-anxious when her child is frustrated or disappointed, the child will get hyper-anxious as well in the face of these strong emotions. A mom who is able to be a little calmer will be more likely to be able to help her child internalize calmness in the face of frustration and disappointment. I am not saying that parents have to do this perfectly. But when parents misbehave in ways they don’t want their kids to misbehave, I encourage them to at least be honest and apologize…because that is after all how they want their children to act when the child misbehaves.

Goulston:  That’s a good point about children imitating either parent, especially how that parent reacts to upsetting situations. I also remember from my psychiatric training how destructive it can be to a child’s development to live in a highly conflicted household. What are your thoughts about that?

Pally: You’re right about that.  Children learn how to act and react and even what to feel from watching what their parents do. And this can be particularly important when kids are watching how their parents handle conflict with each other.  Not only are they learning but it also affects their sense of well-being.

Goulston: What happens when a young child watches their mother and father having a difference of opinion and it escalates to a disagreement, an argument or worse (with either leveling hyperbole, screams, sullenness, “you never’s” and “you always” at each other)?

Pally: Kids in families with this kind of tension and unresolved conflict, feel anxious and insecure but end up learning this is how to deal with conflict.  These kids can then pass on to their kids this tendency to go from purely rational to explosively emotional within seconds.

Goulston: Can you describe what parents who deal with conflict act like?

Pally: A good example of healthy parents are those who respect and treat respectfully the differences in their spouse. And when they do have conflict and the emotions flare, they are able to finally talk it through and make sense of each other’s point of view.  Then they can see how reason (not to be confused with coldly, disdainfully and dismissively delivered logic) and emotion cooperate. This way that child is internalizing and then hard wiring into their brain how their own thinking and talking things through and their emotion will cooperate with each other. This is what some people would call the left brain and right brain working together in an integrated fashion.

Another example is a couple who shows mutual respect and valuing of their differences by suggesting their child go to their spouse if the other can provide what that child needs most. For example a father who is better at solutions than emotional comfort might say to an upset child, “I can see that what you want and need most now is someone to make you feel less upset and feel better.  Your mom is terrific at that.  Go talk to her to help you feel better.”  And alternatively, the mother who may be better at comforting than solutions might say to a child who needs a plan, “You know, your dad is terrific at figuring a way to deal with the situation and help you come up with what you should say or do to make it better.  Go to him and he’ll be great at helping you figure that out.”

When a young child sees parents respecting, appreciating and utilizing the different strengths in each other instead of shaming the child if they need something that each parent is bad at, it fosters a sense of security within the child.   Following that they will internalize it and turn to it unconsciously during times of conflict in their later life and know that things will turn out and that differences don’t make you wrong.  They just make you different.

Goulston: You’re preaching to the choir.  What about parents who think this is a bunch of hooey and then talk about how their parents argued and it wasn’t so bad?

Pally: Show me a parent who thinks this is a bunch of hooey and I’ll show you a parent who would rather be right than make a situation better.  And you’re right, those are the people we need to be speaking to.

Goulston: I don’t know if this would make the point, but many years ago during my training I remembered hearing about a study conducted at a psychoanalytic child study center in Philadelphia in which parents were interviewed and the researchers made some correlations between what the parents said and their disturbed children’s behavior in the playroom.  Since it was a psychoanalytically oriented center they asked parents about their dreams which the parents hadn’t told anyone about.  To their amazement they then discovered that some of these parents’ children were acting out the dreams in their play.  So if a parent had a dream about a plane crashing, their child was crashing planes in the play room.  What do you think that means?

Pally:  It means your children are always watching you and taking in not just what you say and do, but what you feel.  Kind of makes the hairs on your neck stand up, but it doesn’t surprise me. I can’t explain how it works, but we know kids feel and intuit somehow, even things that parents are completely unaware of feeling.

Goulston: And the takeaway from that?

Pally: If you want your children to feel good about themselves and life from their inside out, get yourself better from your inside out… and learn to handle conflict better.

Goulston: Thank you for helping us better understand how parents can raise their children be secure in anxious times by turning a conflicted home into a more loving one.

Pally: My pleasure, thank you. Maybe that’s why we used to refer to it as “home sweet home.”

Goulston: Amen.

As he would stare at the plywood and feel the coolness of those brass pedals, Jed found relief and even a little comfort. He was on his way to becoming autistic. Jed was looking for something in the plywood and the feel of those pedals beyond an escape from the pain in his family that he couldn’t tune out. But he didn’t know what it was.

Then one day, three months into this ritual turned compulsion, a man in his late thirties came into the living room and noticed Jed under the piano. The man walked slowly over to the piano and slowly bent down to speak to Jed. On this day, Jed didn’t notice the man doing that, because Jed was entranced by a knot in the wood under the piano and focused on its elliptical shape and the different colors. He thought it looked like the Solar System and Jed imagined himself in a spaceship venturing out to explore and far away from the life he was living or more accurately wasn’t living.

The man intuitively knew not to say to Jed, “What are you doing under here?” or “Hey want to go do something?” or even “You look pretty sad, let’s go do something fun?” Instead he smiled in a way where his smile touched his eyes and where this mouth and eyes were like two hands reaching out to Jed at which point he said in just the right exact tone: “Hey there, mind if I join you?”

Hitting the tone exactly right, Jed’s “knotty pine fantasy” was interrupted, but he didn’t startle. Without making eye contact and a little anxious, but not fearful, Jed replied, “Suit yourself.”

The man climbed in under the piano and positioned himself perpendicularly to Jed, with each of them leaning back on the respective walls behind them and with their feet about one foot apart from touching.

This continued for three months with Jed and the man under the piano. Gradually, Jed began to stop staring up into the piano’s wood underbelly and started to glance at the man. Then one day, Jed said to the man, “What are you doing here?”

And in the same smile touching eyes touching Jed and with the perfectly inviting, but non intrusive tone of voice, the man said, “You didn’t look like you should be alone.”

As if caught with his vulnerability showing, Jed abruptly looked away, went silent and grabbed on to the solar system knot in the wood above him with his eyes.

Three months later, Jed had begun glancing more frequently at the man, who never seemed to intrude and seemed very content to just be there with Jed. At that point, Jed asked: “Is this normal?”

The man looked at Jed with that smile and those warm eyes and replied, “Is what normal?”

Jed said, “Every day I get home from school and come and sit under this piano for more than an hour. I just wondered if that is normal for a seven year old kid.”

Again with that same connectedness the man smiled with even more understanding and even more love and said, “It’s not typical.”

Jed didn’t know what to do with that expression of patience, kindness and love and again abruptly looked away, but not before some tears of relief in making human contact got through to him.

Three months later (and a full nine months of gestation with the man patiently sitting with Jed under the piano), Jed found himself looking more intently and with deep curiosity at the man, who seemed very present, unobtrusive and apparently quite content with merely keeping Jed company. Jed steeled himself to ask the question that had been gnawing at him and the answer to which would reveal to Jed whether there was hope for him or if he and his situation were truly hopeless (something he had come to believe with nearly complete certainty). “Do I ever get better?” Jed fired at the man, staring into his eyes with a “don’t b.s. me on this!” challenge.

At that point, the man’s smile widened, his eyes sparkled with a loving, caring and tear laden look as if he’d been waiting for Jed to ask this question for six months. “Absolutely!” the man replied with unwavering certainty and confidence.

Jed narrowed his eyes and leaned into the man’s “cup runneth over with love” eyes and inviting full face. “How do you know that?” Jed said with a “truth or dare” and playing for keeps intensity.

The man paused until he could take in all of Jed’s words and position himself such that Jed would not only feel understood by him, but would “feel felt” by him. And then as if sending a healing beam of warmth to remove all the “lesses” from Jed’s feelings of hopelessness, helplessness, worthlessness, meaninglessness, pointlessness, uselessness the man replied: “Because I’m you and we got out.”

At that point Jed was stunned, transfixed in the man’s gaze and started to cry with the relief of finally discovering the home he had been homesick for. He realized that he actually did belong in this world. He belonged to himself.

And with that Jed and the man came out from under the piano. Jed looked back at the piano with appreciation for the haven it had provided him, but realizing that he no longer needed it now that he had found a home in and with himself.

If the above speaks to you about a child you love, how can you go under their piano and join them?

Six year old (precocious) daughter: Is daddy an a-hole?
Mother: Why would you say that?
Daughter: He screams at Joey’s soccer game and sometimes gets kicked out.
Mother: He’s very competitive which is why he is successful.
Daughter: When he reads me a bedtime story he’s always checking his Blackberry.
Mother: He has a lot of people he needs to help in his company.
Daughter: He doesn’t listen to you and talks mean to you.
Mother: You’re right, he is an a-hole.

As much as I wholeheartedly agree with the philosophy behind one of my favorite books, Robert Sutton’s, The No Asshole Rule, I have to conclude that a-holes have always been around and probably always will. An even more disheartening truth is that more often a-holes seem to win whereas nice guys do unfortunately seem to finish last or at least far behind their obnoxious counterparts. And here’s why:

1. They’re not afraid to go first – so they’ll take something first while you’re being polite.
2. They’re not neurotic about hurting your feelings – they figure if you’re foolish enough to be thin skinned, it’s your fault if you get hurt.
3. They’re compelling – they will keep you awake and alert which feels better than feeling bored.
4. They’re watchable – you will keep your eye on them which will keep you focused which also feels better than feeling distracted.
5. They keep you on your toes – and then still manage to step on them.
6. You’ll go out of your way to get respect, love or liking from them – because doing so is a real coup compared to getting the not-so-special respect, love and liking from a giver who gives it to everyone.
7. You know where they’re coming from – they are clear about what they want and don’t want as opposed to nice people who can be so vague that they exasperate you when you just want them to “spit it out.”
8. You’re afraid of what you want to do to them as much as of what they will do to you – they frustrate and infuriate you so much that you will do anything to not have to deal with them, including appeasing them and giving them what they want.
9. They’re arrogant because they’re confident – you think they are assured about what they’re doing which makes you all the more vulnerable if you have self doubts.
10. They use their aggression to their advantage – and your disadvantage if you’re busy trying to not come off that way.
11. They feel both entitled and deserving of whatever they get and take – and so they have no compunction about going after it.
12. They’re not afraid of – and in fact enjoy and take pride in – being an a-hole – and to some extent, you’re jealous of their brazenness.

Doing an “a-holectomy”

Ironically, I (MG) have been seeing increasingly more a-holes in my coaching practice. I know what you’re thinking? Why would they ever go to a shrink for advice or help. There are two main reasons:

1. First the a-hole reason. They’re having a lot of turnover at their company (which doesn’t bother them), but they’re looking for another round of financing and investors are nervous with their management issues and are also having flashbacks of other a-holes who didn’t turn out to be as “F**k You” brilliant as the “F**k You” behaviors they thought they could get away with.

2. The not quite an a-hole reason. They don’t feel so badly about being abrupt and dismissive towards employees or even their spouse, but they absolutely adore their young children and conversations like the one above get to them, because they really don’t want to hurt their kids’ feelings.

I’m reminded of one such man who came in to see me with his fourteen year old only child after his wife said, “You better go see Goulston with Joanne. She’s got a real problem with you.” Now this guy wasn’t that keen on his wife, but his daughter was the absolute love of his life and so he agreed.

When they came in, two things were clear. First, he didn’t have a clue why his daughter was having a problem with him and second, the last place his daughter wanted to be was in my office.

She didn’t talk much, but I could see that as he talked about his bewilderment in a completely non-emotional manner, each sentence out of his mouth was like nails on a chalkboard to her. And she bunkered more deeply into the corner of her side of my couch.

I imagined that he was on better behavior with me than he probably was at home and intuited a scene that probably went on with some regularity.

I stopped the man and followed my hunch and said to his daughter, who was not making eye contact with me: “What’s it like when your dad is talking to you at home in your bedroom, making you nuts and you scream at him at the top of your lungs, ‘GET OUT. LEAVE.’ And then when he does and you close the door behind him you flip him off raising your middle finger at the door.”

She hadn’t told me any of that, but apparently my intuition was spot on, because at that point Joanne, curled up in a ball and started sobbing uncontrollably and nearly dry heaving in what I can best describe as primal agony.

It was clear that something she hated more than her dad, was hating him. It was eating her up inside. And my understanding it and not judging her had released an emotional tsunami that had been building up for weeks or longer.

After a few moments, when it was so clear that she was emotionally gone and beyond conversation or consolation, her father stopped trying to make conversation. Instead, he stared at her and started to cry and touched the tears on his cheeks almost as if the wetness was blood and not quite knowing what to make of it.

I asked him what he was thinking and in a look of utter bewilderment he said, “My daughter, who I love more than anything is in incredible pain, and I think I’m somehow causing it. But that is the last thing I would ever want to do to her. I just don’t get it.”

I told him, “I think you just got it. Stay there, it’ll be okay.”

After several minutes Joanne stopped crying and looked much relieved and that was the beginning of a breakthrough between them that lasted. I’m not sure he ever understood how she could feel that he was hurting her. However he was certainly clear about the fact that she was hurting and that he loved her and didn’t want her to feel pain whatever was causing it.

A final caveat is that it turns out that a number of these a-holes have ADHD and are adrenaline junkies. They’re smart and they’re risk takers and that helps them to keep their adrenaline (i.e. natural Ritalin) at a high level. They absolutely can’t stand boredom or being listless which they feel when they come off an adrenaline high. That causes some of them to become irritable and nasty… sometimes really nasty…sometimes even abusive.

For some of these with true ADHD, treatment with the proper medication and coaching can really calm them down, help them listen better and make them more deliberate in their dealings with their employees and increase investor comfort.

I think however that the best experience was when one of these former a-holes was properly medicated and coached told me how he read a bedtime story to his daughter, had his Blackberry shut off and was totally present with her. After he finished, she snuggled up to him and said, “Thanks for reading to me daddy, I love you.” Made him cry when he told me, made me cry when he told me. He even told me that next on his list was to listen to his wife.

And that, as Mastercard would say is: Priceless.

• What to Say to a Jerk (P.S. may not work with an a-hole)

If you give a child a fish, you feed them for a day;
if you teach a child to fish, you feed them for a lifetime;
but if you teach a child to learn, you feed them for a lifetime
and they don’t have to just eat fish.
- Tim Gallwey, creator of the Inner Game series

Ahh… You’re on vacation and your family is (mostly) getting along. Mom and dad are taking a breather from work and both are almost able to relax. And even though most of you are still checking your Blackberrys and iphones too often, things are going pretty well.

But right around the corner is “back to school” and “back to work” and “back to stress.” One of the most stressful things can be helping your child successfully make the transition back to school and in all likelihood they are not going to be the best sports about it are not “going to go gently into that good car pool or bus.”

What is your role as a parent? I would vouch to say that it is to prepare your child to reach age 18 and be confident, focused, passionate, persevering, patient, resilient, goal-oriented and to handle disappointment and frustration well. Probably most of all it is to teach your child good judgment and the ability to make good decisions especially when they are under pressure.

If developing good judgment is the outcome you’re seeking, what is the best way to interact with your children that results in that? And just as importantly, what are the ways you interact with them and act around them (monkey see, monkey do) that prevent them from developing it?

Clearly if you do things for your child that they should learn to do for themselves you will not only prevent them from developing judgment, you will also prevent them from developing self-reliance, resourcefulness, courage and commitment. And when their peers from India, China and Brazil — who have developed all these qualities — become their bosses, you will prevent your children from being promotable or possibly even hirable.

If you tell them what to do, you will not cripple them as much as if you do it for them, but they will become dependent on you and not develop self-reliance.

If however, you believe in them more than your anxious need to be in control, if you ask them what they think they should do and why and if finally you tell them to give it a try and report back, that will teach them self-reliance, independence and judgment.

Why does your being on a vacation have to do with this?

You have the chance while you’re on a walk or driving casually (vs. their rushing to school and your rushing to work) to talk with your children instead of at them.

And when you do, ask them questions with sincere curiosity about hypothetical situations in the future such as:

“Which of your friends goes too far and wouldn’t surprise you if they got into a lot of trouble this year?” And after they answer, don’t tell them not to be their friends; instead ask them, “Why do you think they’ll get into trouble?” And then after they answer, merely say, “Hmm, that makes sense. Maybe if you’re a good friend, you might be able to help them with that. I guess we’ll just have to see what happens.”

“Which of your subjects do you think you have to stay on top of the homework and which do you think you could do at the last minute if you had to?” And then when they answer that, again say, “Hmm, makes sense to me.”

With such questions you are planting the seeds in them to: a) thinking ahead; b) developing perspective; c) developing judgment.

Meanwhile, enjoy the rest of your vacation.

Please share in the comments your approaches to teaching your child self-reliance, resourcefulness, independence, resilience and judgment.

To learn how to be a better communicator, check out: “Just Listen” (Amacom, $24.95)

Mother: Do you think he’ll put his fist through the wall?
Father: Let’s hope it’s not his head!
And so begins another evening of pillow talk between the parents of an angry, sullen teenager.

What is well known, but kept private is a dynamic psychotherapists see frequently in families that often contributes to teenage rage.

That occurs when one parent is overbearing and overly controlling (either the mother micromanaging her child’s schoolwork and college application process or the father pushing the child to have more drive, motivation and be more aggressive in athletics) and the other is ineffective at keeping the over-the-top parent in check. This results in many teenagers feeling resentment towards the overbearing parent and contempt mixed with pity for the other parent who can neither stand up for the child of for themselves to the over-controlling one.

Add to this the frequent scenario where teenagers see both parents putting on a very pleasant (and to the teen, phony) facade to the outside world, while carrying on with the abusive/passive behavior at home, and that hypocrisy can push many teenagers over the brink (this may have been a possibility in the famous case of Lyle and Erik Menendez who were convicted of killing their parents in August, 1989).

Among one of teenagers’ best traits is a deep sense of justice, but along with it unfortunately comes a sense of outrage regarding the injustice of this family dynamic and the hypocritical behavior of parents who act so differently in public than at home.

To check if this may be what’s going on with your sullen teenager, ask them in a matter of fact way while going for a drive or during some activity (since they hate unsolicited “heart to heart” talks which always feel like a lecture):

- “What’s the most frustrated and angry you have ever felt with your mom/dad or me?”
- “How bad was it for you?”
- “What did it make you want to do?”
- “What did you do?”

Then say (and mean it): “I’m sorry, I didn’t know it was so bad?” Allow for the tears of relief you might unleash in them for finally getting this off their chest.

Finish with: “When I see you doing or not doing something that I believe could hurt you or your future, how do you want me to be with you? I mean, do you want me to say nothing? To wait and let you find out for yourself? To ask your permission to tell you what I see? Or what?”

Then whatever they say, use that approach.

See Also: About Teen Violence: It’s the Rage

I don’t think parents have lost the “will” to connect, guide and teach their children; it’s that too often they just don’t know the “way” to do it.

Over the years I have come upon tips that not only help parents connect with their children, but also help teach them self-reliance and prepare them for life. Here are a few that will help you connect and also teach your child perspective, perseverance, and patience:

Perspective: The real bedtime story. If you still read a story to your children at night, add this exercise. Ask them: “What was the best and worst thing that happened to you today?” Listen to what they say, and respond with “Wow, that’s great” to the good stuff, and “Gee, really, I’m so sorry you felt upset by that” to the bad stuff. Don’t give advice unless they ask for it. Then ask them: “What are you most looking forward to tomorrow and what are you most nervous about? Hear them out the same way as with the first question. Follow up this exercise by telling your story. This exercise helps your child develop perspective to see that both good and bad things happen every day.

Perseverance: When your children tell you about a situation that has clearly upset, scared, angered, or hurt them, resist the temptation to quickly reassure them. Instead, give them a word for what they seem to be feeling by saying: “That must have scared/angered/hurt you, didn’t it?” If they agree, calmly ask them: “How scared/angry/upset, etc. did you feel?” They may only say, “Really bad” or “Very,” but in that moment of saying it to you, they will feel safe, less alone, relieved, and they may even cry. This is a great way of establishing a sense of comfort and calmness in your children after which they will be more open to suggestions and advice. The formula is: Comfort first, Coach second. This exercise will help your children develop the ability to comfort and calm themselves when they are older and enable them to persevere through rough times.

Patience: Do this exercise once a week with your entire family when you’re having dinner together. Ask everyone to talk about something they did in spite of not wanting to do it. You should start the ball rolling. For example, you might say: “I went to this meeting I didn’t want to go to, tried to make the best of it and actually met someone that might help me in my job, and I never would have met that person had I not gone to the meeting.” Then have your husband and kids share something. This exercise helps your children develop tolerance, cooperation skills, and flexibility. It also will make them accept that people have to do things that they don’t always want to do, and because everyone has to do this it’s fair and part of life-and having patience when things don’t go your way works better than having a tantrum.

These steps do not excuse you from spending a certain amount of “face time” with your children (perhaps equal to the “face time” you need to spend with investors when a telephone call won’t suffice) and even experts are not immune from your dilemma.

I remember years ago when my kids were small. They had a nickname for me: “Hi kids, bye kids, love you kids.” I used to laugh when they would teasingly taunt me, but then I realized it wasn’t funny.

Put a smile on your kid’s face

First we are children to our parents,
then parents to our children,
then parents to our parents,
then children to our children.

-Milton Greenblatt, M.D.
as quoted in Get Out of Your Own Way
by Mark Goulston, M.D. and Philip Goldberg

In 1972 while attending medical school, I was working part time doing EKG’s at a Jewish Home for the Aged in Jamaica Plains, Massachusetts. It was a clean and nice facility, but like most of its kind, a “waiting station” before people died. So many of the halls were filled with the infirm elderly in wheel chairs, just staring. It was a very depressing sight for someone my age, with much of my life ahead of me.

On one day I came into the room of Mr. Cohen, a spry, energetic and very much alive man in his eighties. He was such a stark contrast to the rest of the residents there, that I said to him: “You seem so full of energy and so full of life. Why are you living here?”

He replied, “I want to live here.”

His response seemed incredulous to me and I responded with: “I don’t get it. Why would someone like you want to live in a place like this?”

He looked at me and said, “Pull up a chair” and proceeded to try to teach me a lesson about life.

“Nearly seventy years ago, my wife and I escaped the Russia. I can’t count the number of times she saved my life and I saved hers. We moved to Boston and I had a good job owning a tailor shop and we raised a great family, but they have their lives with their children. And since I am really okay, I tell them they don’t have to go out of their way to visit since I am fine and I am helping their mom,” he explained.

“I understand, but I still don’t get why you’re here,” I interrupted.

“Don’t be so impatient,” he replied, “I’m getting to my point. Five years ago, my beloved Goldie had a massive stroke and she lives in a room two floors above where we are standing. She doesn’t speak. Some days she smiles at me when I come in and I like to believe it’s because she recognizes me, but I’m probably kidding myself.”

“I understand, and I have to be going to my next patient, but I still don’t get it. You could visit her and live elsewhere and not live in such a — if you’ll pardon the expression, rather sad — place,” I said rather un-empathically.

“You don’t seem to understand,” Mr. Cohen explained, “every day I get up, take a shower, get dressed and go to Goldie’s room where I clean up the urine she is sometimes laying in, bathe her, change the diaper she wears, dress her and braid her hair the way it was in the old country. Then I sit and read my Jewish newspaper.”

“That’s very loving, but you could could still live elsewhere and do that,” I replied.

“Doctor,” he said emphatically, “I like being here, because every day I get to give my Goldie dignity.”

“That’s wonderful, but you could still live elsewhere,” I said, continuing to be puzzled and heading for the door to see my next patient.

Just before I left, Mr. Cohen had a final comment to make. “Doctor, I do it, because she would do it for me. Maybe someday you will get it.”

Last week I visited my mom who is living in a place like Mr. Cohen’s and whose memory is slipping and last week I started to cut her food.

Maybe someday is now.

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September 30: Leading News teleseminar hosted by Marshall Goldsmith and Patricia Wheeler

September 30: The Entrepreneurial MD telecast

October 2: This Week in Startups guest internet television appearance followed by book signing at offices of Mahalo.com in Santa Monica, CA

October 7: Professional Coaches and Mentors Association Los Angles in person presentation

Have an underperforming J.H.S., H.S. or college kid?
Maybe they’re just lazy…maybe not.
When logic and convincing doesn’t motivate your child
from the outside in, stop doing it…
then try understanding them from their inside out.
One lousy semester, does not a failed year…or life make.

Stop reacting from your frustration

take a deep breath

and read what follows below…

Does it sound like someone you know?

If so, ask them to read it,
ask them which line(s) speak to them and how,
listen, hear and care,
don’t interrupt or give advice unless they ask
and if you’re lucky
and if you haven’t hurt or angered them too much…
they might let you in.
If they do, tell them: “I’m sorry, I never knew you felt so bad,”
Let them get angry at you until they get it out
let them cry and keep crying until they’ve cried themselves out.
Then they might even let you help them
if you ask them the best way to do it
and then you just listen, hear and care…

Don’t be fooled by me.
Don’t be fooled by the face I wear.
For I wear a thousand masks that I am afraid to take off
and none of them are me.

Pretending is an art that’s second nature with me, but don’t be fooled,
for God’s sake don’t be fooled.
I give the impression that I am secure,
that all is sunny and unruffled with me,
within as well as without,
that confidence is my name and coolness my game;
that the waters are calm and I am in command,
and that I need no one.

But don’t believe me, please.
My surface may seem smooth, but my surface is my mask.
Beneath this lies no complacency.
Beneath dwells the real me in confusion, in fear, and aloneness.
But I hide this. I don’t want anybody to know it.

I panic at the thought of my weakness and fear of being exposed.
That is why I frantically create a mask to hide behind;
a nonchalant, sophisticated facade,
to help me pretend, to shield me from the glance that knows.

But such a glance is precisely my salvation.
My only salvation. And I know it.
That is, if it is followed by acceptance, if it is followed by love.
It is the only thing that will assure me of what I can’t assure myself,
that I am worth something.

But, I don’t tell you this. I don’t dare. I am afraid to.
I am afraid your glance will not be followed by acceptance and love.
I am afraid you will think less of me, that you will laugh at me,
and that you will see this and reject me.

So I play my game, my desperate game,
with a facade of assurance without, and a trembling child within.
And so begins the parade of masks, and my life becomes a front.

I idly chatter to you in the suave tones of surface talk.
I tell you everything that is really nothing,
and nothing of what is everything,
of what is crying within me.

So when I am going through my routine
do not be fooled by what I am saying.
Please listen carefully and try to hear what I am not saying.
What I would like to be able to say,
what for survival I need to say, but I can’t say.

I dislike hiding, Honestly!
I dislike the superficial game I am playing, the phony game.
I would really like to be genuine and spontaneous, and me,
but you have got to help me. You have got to hold out your hand,
even when that is the last thing I seem to want.

Only you can wipe away from my eyes that blank stare of breathing death.
Only you can call me into aliveness.

Each time you try to understand and because you really care,
my heart begins to grow wings, very small wings, very feeble wings, but wings.

With your sensitivity and sympathy, and your power of understanding,
you can breathe life into me.

I want you to know that.
I want you to know how important you are to me,
how you can be the creator of the person that is me if you choose to.
Please choose to.

You alone can break down the wall
behind which I tremble, you alone can remove my mask.

You alone can release me from my shadow-world of panic and uncertainty;
From my lonely prison.

Do not pass me by.
Please… do not pass me by.

It will not be easy for you;
a long conviction of worthlessness builds strong walls.

The nearer you approach me, the blinder I strike back.

I fight against the very thing I cry out for. But I am told that
love is stronger than walls, and in this lies my hope.

Please try to beat down those walls with firm hands,
but with gentle hands–for a child is very sensitive.

Who am I, you may wonder? I am someone you know very well.
For I am everyone you meet, I am me and I am you.

– Charles C. Finn