The Defensive Man: Why 'Being Right' Is Costing You Your Relationships

In the spirit of our growth as men, in this episode, I wanted to talk about some of the things that I’ve learned and also a theme that I’ve been hearing from different people in the latest chapter of my life. 

• I started reflecting on my own life and how at different times I’ve reacted the same way.  There have definitely been times in my life when people who cared about me were wanting to give me feedback for my own good and I shut down.  Some younger part of me that wanted to be seen as perfect, or solid, or accomplished.  Anything but needing improvement. 
• As men, we’re programmed to want to provide, to achieve and so much of our culture measures how well we do financially and have we succeeded in the eyes of our neighbors - our houses, our cars, the kinds of schools our kids go to - you name it.
• How do we create a space within ourselves to allow the space for others to express themselves about how they are feeling?  And maybe even how they are feeling about us?  This is so important for our romantic relationships and for those of us with female partners, it’s even more important - they’re so wired to want to express themselves and they do in their female relationships with regularity. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:50

Well, hello listeners, and uh welcome to another episode. I am excited to talk about this today because this is something that has shown up in my life uh over and over again. How do I take feedback? How do I take criticism? How do I grow? You know, and in the spirit of our growth as men, uh, I wanted to talk about some of the things that I've learned around this topic, and some of the things that I've been hearing from different people. There's been a theme that I've been hearing about with respect to how we show up when we get feedback, when we get criticism. Uh, I had a friend who had a good friend, their relationship was a little bit rocky, and uh my friend tried to give his friend some feedback on what wasn't going well, and tried to give his friend some perspective on areas that he might be able to improve in. And uh, while the friend was coming from a good place, his friend shut down. He grew cold, he could feel him pull back. And I know that my good friend, uh, who I've got a pretty open and constructively positive relationship with, he felt helpless. And he felt stuck and really just didn't know how to move forward with that conversation with the relationship with his friend. So I started reflecting on my own life and how at different times I've reacted the same way. There have definitely been times in my life when people who cared about me were wanting to give me feedback, they were coming from a good place, and I shut down. Mentally, I retreated into my own cave. That mental place that I would go to when I just didn't want to hear it. And some younger part of me that you know wanted to be seen as perfect or solid or accomplished in the eyes of my father, my family, my peers, anything but needing improvement. It's just not what I wanted to hear, and I would shut down. And you know, through this, I was reminded of a book I read a few years ago by Carol Dwight, and as a book on growth mindset. At that time, it started to help me shift how I thought about being given feedback and how you know to improve different areas of my life and getting that perspective from different people. I mean, let's face it, we can't really know our blind spots. It's why they call them blind spots, is because we can't see them. And it's a great quote, Carol Dwike writes why waste time proving over and over how great you are when you could actually just be getting better. And she says, in a growth mindset, challenges are exciting rather than threatening. So rather than thinking, oh, I'm going to reveal my weaknesses, you say, Wow, here's a chance to grow. And look, this is not easy. You know, as men were programmed to want to provide, to achieve. And the reality is that so much of our culture measures how well we do financially, have we succeeded in the eyes of our neighbors? What are our houses like? What are our cars like? What's the kinds of schools that our kids go to? You name it. It's all about keeping up with the Joneses. And when you layer the cultural imprint that's been handed down to us for generations, and our younger childhood experiences of being reprimanded, corrected, shouted at when we misbehaved or when we didn't do well in school. It's the perfect recipe for just simply being exhausted from criticism or feedback. It just wasn't a pleasant experience. And so our subconscious, our brains, has literally learned to cringe when we hear feedback or some kind of criticism about what we're doing or what we're not doing. And our nervous systems react and they want us to pull back, they want us to retreat from that feedback. I know that in my last marriage, receiving feedback from my now ex-wife was very hard for me. It stung when she tried to tell me what she needed from me. And instead of hearing, you know, her with empathy and with understanding and working hard at creating a space for her to feel safe to tell me, my younger parts would show up a lot of the time, and I would shut down, and I would feel like I was failing her in some way. And, you know, as men, when our romantic partners communicate with us about the things that they need, why do we hear it as if we're failing them in some way? I know I did, and it was so hard for me to get out of my own way. And we hear that and we treat, retreat into that cave. And I certainly did. And I work at this to this day, and I think that there's one great thing that I learned, you know, from my last marriage is that the things that she was wanting to communicate to me were really all about her. And my programming would want to make it about me. Couldn't help it. It wanted to protect me from the hurt that I'd felt and what I'd heard in my younger years. And the survival part of me had built up a subconscious and a nervous system that even to this day, when I'm in a position to get feedback, my heart starts to race. My uh blood starts to pump, my heart rates go up, and I can feel it. And so in my marriage, unfortunately, you know, it cost me the opportunity to grow from what she was trying to tell me, and the opportunity for me to learn and grow for myself. Because at the end of the day, that's what we're here for. Listeners, we're here to grow for ourselves and other people's perspective, you know, provide us with the opportunity to be able to do that. And look, when we compound with social media and what's going on, and we've talked about this before in previous episodes, and all that that creates in us, the need to feel like we have to outperform everyone and live up to some unseen jury's expectation of how we live our lives, it gets even harder for us. So, how do we slow down? How do we create a space within ourselves to allow the space for others to express how they're feeling about us, what they see, how they think we can improve. And this is so important for our romantic relationships, but it's also important for our families. And for those of us with female partners, it's even more important. Why? Because they are so wired to want to express themselves. And this is what they do in their female relationships, and so when they try to bring that to us, it's incredibly hard for them too. And so, how do we find some ground where we can just slow down and create the right space? Look, I know that for me, having some awareness of where this comes from in my past, what the triggers are that cause my nervous system to want to shut down, to make my heart race, my pulse going like crazy, wants me to pull away and create some anxiousness in me. And for me, you know, I remember that when I was young, probably before I was five years old, my father was very critical of me. And he even got angry with me, and I remember feeling his rage and feeling that behind his criticism that anger was right there. And at times it deeply hurt me. And what did that do? Well, it caused me to want to show up perfectly for him, and you know, be that perfect little soldier that he wanted me to be. And, you know, it wanted me to avoid the truth, escape the criticism, escape the punishment. Um, you know, and sometimes, yeah, avoid being truthful because I didn't want to suffer that wrath. And so knowing that, it's helped me slow down. It's helped me recognize ahead of time that, you know, my heart rate will pick up, my breathing will quicken. And knowing that allows me to breathe just a little deeper, find my body, and stay as present as I can. And don't get me wrong, this is still an ongoing practice of mine that I am learning, and I've got a long way to go to master this. But every single time that somebody wants to give me feedback, even today at work, somebody gave me feedback. I could feel that part of me wanting to pull back and retreat. And I worked really hard to stay present and open. Because it's as much about creating the space for that other person to feel safe with giving me that feedback as it is for me to receive it. So I have done my best to reprogram myself with the knowledge that any feedback, and I mean any feedback, is here for my learning. Any hardship or challenge is here, folks, for us to learn something, for us to be taught something. That's what life actually is. And I believe that it's not what happens to us, it's how we choose to react to what happens to us. You've probably heard of Marcus Aurelius, he's a famous Stoic philosopher, a Roman empire, one of the most famous Roman emperors of all time. And he wrote, everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact. Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth. We choose our own perspective. And so it's not what happens to us, it's not what's said to us, it's how we choose to react to those things. And for those of us who want to be a better version or the best version of ourselves, consider this. There is no way that we can be the best version of ourselves from our own perspective alone. How else can we see and have knowledge of our blind spots? As I said earlier, they're blind to us. So here's my invitation to all of you: know thyself. And I know that that's easier said than done. But when it comes to your relationships in your life, think about how you're handling input and feedback from others, especially those that are really important to you. Do you shut down? Do you get dismissive? Do you pull away from your partner? Is there some part of you that you can feel you're shutting down? And if this is true for you, then I invite you to do what you can to understand that you're limiting yourself, and sometimes worse, you're impacting others by not allowing them to express themselves. So, can you do some work to go back in time and build some self-awareness of where these things might come from in you? Where do you get shut down? Is it like me with your father? I know a lot of us suffer from the same thing. And where in your past, who in your past causes you or caused you to clam up and shut down? Who did you want to avoid when feedback or criticism or correction came up? Listeners, can you rewire yourself to allow yourself to create a space within you, within yourself, to receive the feedback and to allow others to give it to you? Look, like an athlete getting coached on the field of whatever sport you played, this is coaching on the field of your own life. And like all performance, this is an opportunity to improve yours. So, like I always say, listeners, keep growing, keep evolving, my good man. Practice this with yourself, practice this with your friends. Be open, be conscious, and be aware of this. This is how you will become the best version of yourself. And this is how we live a life worth living. And this is how we leave a legacy that our children can learn and grow from. Thank you, listeners, and wish you the best, and give you this invitation to just keep growing.