The subject of controlling is discussed in many Real Love blogs and books. Click HERE for one example.
Controlling is best characterized by expectations, which can be identified easily. How can you know whether you have expectations of another personāwhether you are being controlling? A few indications:
1. When you make a request, you have a sense of urgency about it. Youāre not peaceful when you āaskā for what you want.
2. If your request is denied, you become frustrated, sometimes annoyed.
3. You canāt take ānoā for an answer, and if you are denied, you āexplainā repeatedly why your request should be granted.
4. You feel like you have a right to receive what you request.
But thereās more to controlling, as illustrated when June called and said, āMy husband, Don, says he never feels loved by me. I feel like a complete failure.ā
āI doubt whether youāre a complete failure, but we could explore whether youāre loving. It might be true that YOU are not loving, OR perhaps HE is incapable of feeling loved, or there might be a combination of the two conditions. Have you asked him specifically WHY he doesnāt feel loved by you? In other words, what do you doāor what do you fail to doāthat leads him to the conclusion that you donāt love him?ā
āHe says Iām controlling.ā
āIf thatās trueāthat youāre controllingāthen he couldnāt possibly feel loved by you, because controlling is profoundly selfish. When we control people, we do it for ourselves, not for them.ā I explained the criteria for expectations listed above, and she assured me that she was not having expectations.
āYou might be right,ā I said, ābut there are other ways to control people. Give me a recent example of a request that you made of him, where he obviously didnāt like itāwhere he indicated that he felt controlled.ā
āI said that I wished he would listen better and give me more feedback when I speak to him.ā
āDoes he naturally tend to listen to other people well and give them lots of feedback when they speak to him?ā
āNot really, no.ā
āSo youāre asking him to be different from how he naturally is. That is called controlling.ā
āBut this is getting in the way of our marriage.ā
āYes, I believe that, but so is your controlling. You simply cannot ask him to be different from who he really is. If you do, thereās no way he could feel loved by you.ā
āSo what can I do?ā
āNow that is a useful question. What you can do is to make requests for him to do a specific thingāor not do a specific thingāon a particular occasion, but you canāt ask him to change the patterns of his behavior that are a natural result of who he is.ā
āI donāt quite understand.ā
āLetās see how you can get more of what you want without controlling. Youād like more listening and feedback from Don, yes?ā
āYes.ā
āFine, then you can do what I just suggested. You can ask for a specific thing on a particular occasion. So what would that look like, in real life? Tell me about some subject in your marriage where youād like more feedback from Don.ā
āI think Iām being less critical about the messes he makes around the house, but I donāt have any idea whether he has noticed my efforts. Iād like some feedback about that.ā
āPerfect. Letās suppose youāve just said something to Don about how youāve been trying to be less critical about cleaning up after himself, and he doesnāt say anything.ā
āThatās exactly what heād do. Heād say nothing.ā
āSo now you can say to him, āDon, I just said that I was trying to be less critical or demanding about your cleaning up after yourself. You didnāt respond, and you probably didnāt know that I needed you to. Would you be willing to tell me what you think about what I said? Do you agree with it? Or disagree? In this moment, I just need to know what you think. Have you noticed my attempts to be less critical? Have I deceived myself?ā
āDon tends not to like it when I ask him to do ANYTHING, even once. Doesnāt like to be asked to pick something up off the floor, or to get something at the store on the way home. Nothing. If I ask, he says Iām controlling.ā
āIf itās true that you can limit your requests to specific actions, and do it without expectationsāmeaning without disappointment, manipulation, and so onāand he STILL calls that controlling, then he may simply be profoundly selfish. He may be using the accusations of controlling to keep from having to do anything selfless. Youāll only figure that out by following the guidelines for requests.ā
If you want something from your partner, you can always ask for what you wantāa specific task or action in a given momentābut not for an overall change in behavior patterns. You might even be RIGHT that those behavior patterns NEED to change, but the message of such an expectation almost uniformly will be interpreted as unloving. Behavior patterns change with the loss of emptiness and fear, and that happens with loving.
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