The Rational Basis® of Happiness Podcast

The Selfish Path to Romance.

Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and Amazon.com.

You have a feeling like, you know, something. I don't think I'll succeed in this project. I've worked so hard, and I just feel like, you know, it's two steps forward, two steps backward. So maybe I'll never succeed. Maybe it's just me. Here's the question from Brad: Hi, Dr. Kenner, I have this business venture based on a software program that I've developed for specific businesses. Ten years in the making. I've read about many successful people, and they say that they always believed they would succeed. They never let themselves think otherwise. But I'm afraid to believe that I can or will succeed, or I simply can't believe that I will succeed. I'm constantly failing, like I'll fail, which leads me to wanting to quit. Why is that? And what can I do to keep going and try to achieve my goal? And what does it mean to believe you will succeed? As a rational person, I can't seem to wrap my head around that. Somehow it seems easy for me to accept and believe that achieving a business goal of the magnitude that I'm working on will never happen to me. Now, how rational is that? Thanks for your help. Dr. Kenner, Brad, and the first thing I want to say to you, Brad, is kudos to you because you have succeeded in identifying a big thought barrier to your own success, a core idea that you hold, a core premise that is making success difficult. It's like standing in your way, going, and you can't succeed, like a bully. And part of when you can identify that, then once you're honest with yourself, you can figure out what's going on. Why do you carry this stinking thinking along with you through life? Because it's obviously undermining your pleasure and your optimism. So what you need are some tools to challenge what, in cognitive therapy, is called stinking thinking. Everybody engages in it at some point. You know, I'll never complete this project. I'll never clean my room. It's just me. I can't change, or I'll never be able to succeed with this software program, and I've put ten years into it. What's the use? Why bother? So what if I told myself, if I had a similar software program, and I told myself, Ellen, you can never succeed. You know, I think I would want to say to myself, "Okay, Ellen, what do you mean by that?" I ask myself the question because that's so global: I can never succeed. It just means like, well, you know, life sucks, and then you die. You don't want that attitude through life. So I want the skill of getting specific. Ellen, what do you mean? Instead of global, an attack on ourselves, which always wreaks havoc? Ellen, all of you can never succeed. Now I laugh at that because, as I'm saying that, and this might happen to you too, Brad, if you said, "Brad, all of you can never succeed," you might find a little laughter inside thinking, "Well, I've succeeded at some things," and certainly you have, and you want to count your successes too. So you might think, "Well, I'll get a little more specific." Then that's the skill. I can never succeed in promoting this software product because I don't have the marketing skills. Okay, that's a little bit more specific. And if it were me, I could say, "Oh my gosh, that points me to new possibilities. I can learn some marketing skills. I could read books, I could get advice from experts, and I can check online and look for some free advice." But if that's not making a dent, if I still have this very deep, profound, almost poured-in-cement feeling that I can't succeed, and it makes me want to quit after working ten years on a project, I want to sit down and ask myself the question, "Hey, I got to interrupt this because we've got to pay some bills. Thirty seconds. That's it. A very quick ad, and then Alan will be back."

Romance. Oh, I wish guys knew more about what we want from a relationship. Boy, I wish I knew more about what I want. Where's that ad I saw? Here it is, the Selfish Path to Romance, a serious romance guidebook. Download chapter one for free at selfishromance.com and buy it at Amazon.com. Hmm, the Selfish Path to Romance, that is interesting. If I still have this very deep, profound, almost, almost poured-in-cement feeling that I can't succeed, and it makes me want to quit after working ten years on a project, I want to sit down and ask myself the question, "Who is in the room when I feel that I can't succeed? What people or persons from my past come to my mind?" And for any of us, the critical people will come to your mind. Maybe it's a parent who treated you as a failure, or a sibling, you know, your brother saying, "Who do you think you are? What do you think you're smart?" Or something, "Oh, you'll never succeed." Or maybe it's they treated you as very needy and unable to succeed. "Oh, dear, dear. I'll help you with that." And you just felt like no matter what you try, they could always better it. And you just felt like a failure. If that's the situation, you need to have a talk with them, even if they're not alive anymore. You can do this in therapy. I did this in therapy many times with my clients. But you can have what's used in the empty chair technique. Put that parent or sibling, or maybe it was a bully in school who told you you could never succeed, and say, "What's up with that? Of course, I can succeed. Here's what I've done." And you start naming the things. And besides, I don't have to listen to you anymore. So you need methods to challenge a wrong premise that you're holding. And there are wonderful cognitive therapy techniques, and I will recommend a book in a moment. The second question you can ask yourself is, "What situation does this bring to mind?" Because when you work really hard for something only to have it fall through, you can be left with a very profound feeling of, "Oh, what's the use?" And it tells you not to expect success. So let's say that I worked really hard to get into the college of my choice, and I got rejected. It would have been, and I did, I got rejected the first year. It could have been very easy for me to throw up my hands and say, "What's the use? Why bother? And I'm not going to try for anything great anymore." I put so much time and effort into that, why bother? What's the use? Instead, I went on a different thought path, and I told myself, "Ellen, what do you need to learn?" And I called the college and asked them what I was missing that would give me a better chance the following year. And they told me, "Well, you need clinical experience." I didn't need that before I went to graduate school. So I got clinical experience, and the following year, lo and behold, I got into grad school that next year. So it could be a pain—the pain of not getting into the college of your choice or not getting a job you wanted. Or I can remember trying out for a play as a kid and being used as a backstage hand, so I concluded I could never act. Those are painful experiences, and many times we try to protect ourselves from not experiencing that pain again. You want to have empathy for yourself, though. You want to be your own best friend. And the book that I want to recommend that will help you reframe and challenge these old premises and adopt healthier ones is "Mind Over Mood." And you can go to my website, DrKenner.com. I've got that book and many other books there that I highly recommend. Lastly, you want to count your successes. Brad, you developed a software program for over ten years. Look at the trace—that's perseverance, stick-to-itiveness, longer-range thinking, all qualities that make for success. So you want to really focus on your strengths. Write them down, bring them to mind, and make them much more important than these voices from the past.

And here's a little more from Dr. Kenner:

"Come on in and try not to ruin everything by being you."

Maybe we could live without the wisecracks.

And that's from "As Good As It Gets." Are you dealing with someone who's sarcastic in your life? How do you deal with them? If they come in and say, "So you think you're so smart, do you?" or "Oh, that looks great on you," and you can hear this, you can feel the smear that they're sending you. How do you cope with that? One of the ways you can do that is to actually identify, "You know, that sounds sarcastic. Is something bothering you, or what's on your mind? You know, sometimes you're so nice, and it just sounds like something's a little off today." You can inquire. You can put the spotlight not on yourself but on their sarcasm. And sometimes they'll say, "Yeah, I'm really upset. I had a bad day at work, and I'm taking it out on you. Sorry about that." Sometimes they just continue with the sarcasm, and you think, "You smart alec, huh?" And you say, "You know, I find this unpleasant. When you want to talk sometime or tell me what's really on your mind, let's chat, and now is not a good time for either of us." And in that way, you're very self-respecting.

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

Here's an excerpt from "The Selfish Path to Romance" by Dr. Kenner and Locke.

If you must criticize, avoid understating or overstating. Consider Marcy saying to her husband, Doug: "The past three days, you told me you'd be home for dinner at six, and I planned for dinner at that time. When you came home at 7:30 again, I felt angry. I wish you had called me. I waited around when I could have gone to the gym." Doug might then say, "I'm very sorry I didn't call. I really welcome your meals after my hectic days. I'll make sure from now on to notify you as soon as I know my schedule has changed." Had Marcy told Doug that he was always late, he would have immediately recalled times he came home on time or early, and he would have dismissed her complaint. He then might have attacked her with times she was late. They would have failed to communicate effectively.

Download chapter one for free at DrKenner.com and Amazon.com.