The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

Transcript

The Selfish Path to Romance. Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and @amazon.com blind.

Good heavens, they expect one blind child to teach another. Here’s a house full of grown-ups who can’t cope with a child. How can an inexperienced, half-blind Yankee schoolgirl manage great improvement? Now we have two of them to look after.

You’ll be quiet.

I was agreeing with you.

You talk too much.

Nothing I say is right.

Why say anything?

What do you do when somebody is just picking on you? You prepare a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner and everything is perfect. The turkey is succulent. You made fresh cranberry sauce with walnuts in it. Everything is mouth-watering. And your husband comes in and says, “You burnt the bread again, didn’t you?” and you only slightly burnt the rolls.

What do you do when people are always picking on you? Nothing is ever good enough. You know the type of person. You probably have at least a handful of them, maybe a dozen of them, or a baker’s dozen of them in your life.

With me to discuss this type of bad judgment is Dr. Andy Bernstein, my resident philosopher. Andy, I know you have your PhD in philosophy and you teach at the universities. You’ve given addresses at Harvard and Stanford and RPI all over the country, and you’re the author of many articles, Cliff Notes, and a novel, The Heart of a Pagan. Welcome aboard.

Good to be back, Ellen.

It’s great to have you here.

Thank you.

I know that I’ve been around people where I’m trying to do something and I know I’m doing it 99% well, and they will find that 1% flaw in it and say, “Yeah, but you forgot this,” or “Why didn’t you do it this way?” And it’s not like I’m paying them to be a consultant. It’s just that they never focus on the good. How do you deal with that type of a situation?

Well, I think there are several things that you would have to do in the end. The first thing is, remember that that kind of person in everyday terminology is called somebody who’s judgmental. And there’s a reason for that. We’re talking about using your own judgment to make evaluations. So I would say first of all to such a person, if by my standards, if I think that, as you put it, 99% or more of the work is good and they’re picking on some trivial element, first of all, make sure that you repudiate their judgment.

At the Thanksgiving meal, everything is beautiful, perfect. I’ve spent so much time doing it, and someone walks in and says, “Is that burnt bread? I mean, did you burn the bread?”

Yeah. I think internally the first thing you need to be able to do is be willing and able to go by your own judgment. I’ve seen it in cases where I’ve given lectures where I thought it was very good and other people criticized it, or vice versa—I thought it was flawed and other people loved it. You have to be willing to go by your own judgment as a prerequisite.

So if somebody criticizes you in your thinking unjustly, you have to make sure to reject their criticism internally. Because you know that what you’ve done is good. And so you take pride in it, and you simply repudiate that kind of judgment. Don’t accept it.

And then the second thing: if you do that, you can respond to the person in a way that’s neither meek nor hostile. Because it’s not affecting you. You’re not hurt or stung by it. You’re very confident in your judgment.

And then respond to them in a very reasonable way. You could say, “Well, look at all these things here. They’re so good. That turkey is plump and delicious. The potatoes are so creamy. What do you mean?”

If you don’t accept the unjust judgment of the critic, then you won’t get defensive, you won’t get hostile, and you won’t start crying tears of humility either. You’ll be able to respond in a reasonable and courteous way to the person.

Okay, so let’s say it’s the mother-in-law that comes in. You go, “Oh my God, I can’t believe your mother’s doing this again. She picks on me every time she walks in this house. There’s dust over here. Why don’t you put your dishes over here, honey? And you don’t need this old milk in your refrigerator.” And I mean, the woman in my house is so nice, and she never notices anything good. And I just can’t stand her. I am so upset.

You’re saying that instead of having that type of a response—

Hey, I’ve got to interrupt this because we’ve got to pay some bills. Thirty seconds—that’s it. A very quick ad. Then Ellen will be back.

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Hmm, The Selfish Path to Romance—that is interesting.

You’re saying that instead of having that type of a response, you can have a much more self-respecting response, saying, “Oh, this is your mother-in-law again. We’re in for the show. Let’s see what she can pick on this time.” And you let it roll off you. You don’t engage her in battle. You don’t fight her. She runs her course. But while she’s doing that, you can say, “Well, didn’t I cook a nice meal?” Right?

Exactly. I mean, I think an important book here for everybody to read is Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead, because she really focuses on the importance of going by your own judgment. And again, if we’re speaking in the context where you honestly, by your most conscientious standards, believe that you’re doing good work—it’s not just a whim or a feeling—but by your own most honest standards you’ve done good work, and then your mother-in-law comes in and by your standards irrationally criticizes you.

People who lack self-confidence, who are unwilling to go by their own judgment, are hurt by that kind of irrational criticism. They take it to heart. They take it personally. It stings them. And so they’re in pain, and they break down in tears and abase themselves before the bullying critic. Or else they get defensive and start fighting.

And just like you said, both of those alternatives won’t get you anywhere. The best way is: when you know internally that you’re doing good work, you can let your mother-in-law or any other bullying critic just go on without it affecting you. You’ll know when they run out of gas. When the windbag finally gets tired of yelling at you, you can then say, “Well, how do you like the soup?”

It’s wonderful.

Yeah, sometimes in therapy I’ll tell people who come in and say they have this type of person in their life, I’ll say, “Well, if a two-year-old or a four-year-old came over to you and said, ‘You’re stupid, you’re dumb, you’re an idiot, you don’t do anything right,’ how would you respond?” They say, “I’d laugh.”

And it’s not that you laugh defiantly at the person or engage in battle. It’s just you’re laughing because it’s not important. You don’t take their estimate of what you’re doing as valid. You’re going, as you say, by your own standards. Right?

And so that’s wonderful.

Now I’m going to be the critical parent. I’ll be the critical mother-in-law for a moment.

I’m sure you can do that.

Well, try to see—let’s take a look at her and see what’s behind her.

“You know, I’m only doing this for my daughter-in-law’s good. I’m much older than her. I’ve been here and I’ve done this. I know how to run a household. Don’t tell me I don’t know how to run a household. And I’m telling her that you don’t put the dishes here, that you have to look at your milk every day to make sure it’s not expired. She doesn’t know these things. I’m just trying to educate her. I’m trying to help her.”

Well, you know, if the mother-in-law is sincere in her statement that she’s doing this benevolently out of goodwill towards her daughter-in-law and trying to educate her on how to be a good homemaker, then she needs to check her premises here.

The way to help somebody is not by a kind of negative and critical berating. All that can do is hurt somebody and put them on the defensive and cause antagonism in the relationship. What she needs is a whole new strategy of how to help her daughter-in-law.

And I think the way you do it is by putting it in a positive way. She might say to her, “Honey, I think the first thing you’ve got to do if you want to help somebody get better is find the positives in what they’re already doing. Show them that you recognize their virtues first so that you don’t put them on the defensive.”

And the mother-in-law in that case could say to her daughter-in-law, “Sweetheart, I really appreciate the way you work so hard. I see you really work at keeping the house. I admire you for that. You really love my son, and you’re good to him. I appreciate that. But you know, I think there’s a way you might be able to do this better. If you’re willing to listen to me, I can give you some— you know, I don’t want to tell you how to live your life, but I’m 30 years older than you and I have some experience. Are you interested in what I have to say?”

And okay—

Sure, yeah. Because you’re inviting. You’re saying, “Are you interested in what I have to say?” And the daughter can say no. If she says yes, then you have your invitation. You can give the advice. But you can’t force it on her and you can’t assume that you’re right and that there’s only one way. She may have a legitimate way.

I want to thank you very much for joining us today. This is Dr. Andy Bernstein and I’m Dr. Ellen Kenner on The Rational Basis of Happiness. And we’ve been talking about the importance of dealing with very judgmental—irrationally judgmental, not healthy judgment—people.

How do you deal with these irrational people in your life? You don’t take them seriously. And if you want to give good advice, you catch them doing something right. And you also want to value yourself. You want to learn how to think independently for yourself.

For more Dr. Kenner podcasts, go to DrKenner.com, and please listen to this ad.

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