Glasser Wisdom: My Plan Is

Glasser Wisdom: My Plan Is

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic fiction that honors spiritual traditions that nurture the soul. She is also on the Senior Teaching Faculty of The William Glasser Institute.

Dr. William Glasser first came to notice in the 1960’s due to his work at the Ventura School for Girls and the backwards of the V.A. Hospital in Los Angeles. I heard of Dr. Glasser in the late 60’s but it was 1978 before I took my first Basic Intensive Training. To learn more about this remarkable man’s life, I encourage you to read “Champion of Choice” by Jim Roy.

We’ve explored good and bad judgement and understand that “Useless Judgement” can and does negatively impact our lives. If you paid attention to your negative self-talk you’ve identified useless judgement in your life.

Here’s how to take control of Useless Judgement.

Write down the negative self-talk you’ve identified.

Rate each on a scale of 1 – 5 with 5 having the most negative impact.

Rank them in order starting with the ‘5’s’ and working your way down to the 1’s.

Look at the 5’s. Which one do you want to work on first?

Let’s say you pick

“I suck at technology. I can’t even use my smart phone well. I’m always hitting the wrong button and hanging up on people.”

This is a useless judgement you have total control over. So, what’s your plan?

You may now see “I suck at technology” and say “I don’t want to spend any time working on this. It really isn’t that important.”

Change the number.

Is it now a 1 or 2? Maybe a 3?

Next is “I’m too critical of myself. I’m constantly telling myself something is too hard or I can’t do it.”

This one is a bit vague. But if you don’t want to get more specific, you can still work on it as it is.

Thank yourself for doing something right

What can you say or do when you hear yourself being critical of you? Saying something is too hard and that you can’t do it?

Use your creativity. Imagine what your life would be like, how you would view yourself if this theme of negative self-talk was eliminated or at least greatly reduced?

If you appreciated the work you do?

If this is too challenging for you to deal with on your own, where can you turn for help?

A close caring compassionate friend?

A counselor?

I always recommend people read Dr. Glasser’s books to help stir their imaginations into finding their answers.

What’s important to take from this series of posts is
1.       The only person’s behavior you can control is your own.
2.       If you want your life to be different, only you can make that happen.
3.     Taking each item that negatively affects you (one at a time) and making a plan to do things differently works.

You may choose to seek professional help, you may choose to work alone, you may choose to join a group with similar issues.

By making a plan and following through, you will (I’m fairly sure) notice a shift in the direction you want to go.

Caveat: negative self-talk is powerful and when we want to make changes and eliminate or reduce it, expect an upsurge. Take a deep breath and remind yourself that this is a Useless Judgement whose time has come and it doesn’t want to leave. Wish it well and let it go.

Remember: Your Choices Today Create Your Tomorrow or keeping with the language we’ve been using Your Judgements Today Create Your Tomorrow.

Judge well.

You can learn more about The Sacred Women’s Circle series on my website.

Check out my Windtree Press author page.

Follow me on Twitter: @JudithAshley19

I’m also on Facebook

© 2016 Judith Ashley

Glasser Wisdom: Reducing/Eliminating Useless Judgement

Glasser Wisdom: Reducing/Eliminating Useless Judgement

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic fiction that honors spiritual traditions that nurture the soul. She is also on the Senior Teaching Faculty of The William Glasser Institute.

Dr. William Glasser first came to notice in the 1960’s due to his work at the Ventura School for Girls and the backwards of the V.A. Hospital in Los Angeles. I heard of Dr. Glasser in the late 60’s but it was 1978 before I took my first Basic Intensive Training. To learn more about this remarkable man’s life, I encourage you to read “Champion of Choice” by Jim Roy.

How do we eliminate or at least reduce Useless Judgement from our lives?

By remembering The Only Person We Can Control Is Ourselves.

If we remember this, we’ve reduced all Useless Judgement focused on other people.

That, however, still leaves ‘us’.

How do we reduce or eliminate Useless Judgement when it comes to us?

We do have control over our own behavior thus over our own choices.

This next week, keep track of your negative self-talk. Perhaps jot down the theme you see or hear as you go about your day.

You might also want to ‘catch yourself doing something right’ and congratulate yourself on your good judgement.

I’ve found that spending a few minutes before I go to bed to review my day is important. However, I focus on that for which I’m grateful. If you want to adopt that practice as the time you ‘catch yourself doing something right’, it's a perfect time to do so.

I do Not recommend that you review your negative self-talk at that time. Perhaps after dinner? Or when brushing your teeth? But not as you get ready to slip into your bed and fall asleep.

See you next Monday when we will check out how to move forward now that you know where to find your Useless Judgements.

You can learn more about The Sacred Women’s Circle series on my website.

Check out my Windtree Press author page.

Follow me on Twitter: @JudithAshley19

I’m also on Facebook

© 2016 Judith Ashley

Glasser Wisdom: Useless Judgement

Glasser Wisdom: Useless Judgement

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic fiction that honors spiritual traditions that nurture the soul. She is also on the Senior Teaching Faculty of The William Glasser Institute.

Dr. William Glasser first came to notice in the 1960’s due to his work at the Ventura School for Girls and the backwards of the V.A. Hospital in Los Angeles. I heard of Dr. Glasser in the late 60’s but it was 1978 before I took my first Basic Intensive Training. To learn more about this remarkable man’s life, I encourage you to read “Champion of Choice” by Jim Roy.

“Useless Judgements” What are they?

Useless judgements are those that, in some way, harm us. Here’s a partial list:

I’m too stupid to learn X.

I’m not good enough.

My spouse/kids/friends/neighbors are selfish/don’t care about my problems.

I’ll never be able to XXX.

S/he should do XXX.

S/he shouldn’t do XXX.

If I was a good parent my kids would always/would never XXX.

Or in more general terms:

Our negative self-talk.

Our critical judgement of others.

Our efforts to mold someone, to make them change.

If you read “The Ultimate Question” you saw the list of the Seven Deadly and Seven Caring Habits that Dr. Glasser created. Not only do the Seven Deadly Habits leech the joy from our relationships with others but as, if not more important, they suck the joy out of our own lives.

When you think of the term Useless Judgements, what comes to mind? Pay attention to where useless judgements pop up in your life. Where are you? What are you doing? Who is with you?

Next week I’ll share one way to eliminate or at least reduce the incidents of “Useless Judgement” in your life.

And for those of you who love spelling, "judgement" and "judgment" are both listed in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary on my desk.

You can learn more about The Sacred Women’s Circle series on my website.

Check out my Windtree Press author page.

Follow me on Twitter: @JudithAshley19

I’m also on Facebook

© 2016 Judith Ashley

Glasser Wisdom: External Control - Does It Ever Work? by Judith Ashley

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic fiction that honors spiritual traditions that nurture the soul. She is also on the Senior Teaching Faculty of The William Glasser Institute.

Dr. William Glasser first came to notice in the 1960’s due to his work at the Ventura School for Girls and the backwards of the V.A. Hospital in Los Angeles. I heard of Dr. Glasser in the late 60’s but it was 1978 before I took my first Basic Intensive Training. To learn more about this remarkable man’s life, I encourage you to read “Champion of Choice” by Jim Roy.

I remember clearly when Dr. Glasser told a story about a friend of his who taught criminal justice classes at a university. His friend attended a conference and even though he’d been warned about the importance of being careful when going in or out of his room, the professor found himself face-to-face with a robber.

The robber had a gun and demanded the professor’s wallet.

The professor refused.

“I’ll give you my money,” he said pulling out cash and handing it over, "but not my wallet."

The robber grabbed the money and ran.

As the story goes, the professor didn’t even give him all of his money.

Faced with an armed robber, he did not do as he was told. Not only did he not give him all of his money, he didn’t hand over his wallet.

Why? Because of the hassle of getting a new driver’s license, credit cards, etc.

Each of us has at least one story to tell, perhaps not of facing an armed robber, but a time and place where we were asked/told to do something and we didn’t.

Each of us also has numerous stories to tell where we did something we weren’t thrilled to do. Often in those circumstances we say to ourselves and anyone else within ear shot that we ‘have to do this’ or ‘XXX made us do this’.

When we do this, we denied our choice in the matter.

How does denying we have choices help us?

I don’t think it does but I observe people every day use Dr. Glasser’s Seven Deadly Habits to try to control the world around them (and even themselves).

Criticizing
Blaming
Complaining
Nagging
Threatening
Punishing
Rewarding to control (bribes)

The challenge is that there are times it “appears as if” they work. The student sits back down. Your spouse takes care of the task. Your children go to bed with no complaining. Your mother-in-law agrees with you. We all can give examples where one of these deadly habits "works".

Are you someone who criticizes yourself for not doing, being, having, etc.?

Does it work?

Sometimes? Why only sometimes?

Even rewarding with a bribe which at least can have a positive element to it, doesn’t always work.

When you think about problems, whether in your own life or in the world, it generally boils down to negative relationship.

Glasser’s Seven Caring Habits: (I first talked about the Deadly and Caring habits in a 2015 post. For more examples and ideas you can read it here).

Supporting
Encouraging
Listening
Accepting
Trusting
Respecting
Negotiating differences

are ways to create and maintain positive healthy relationships.

Next week we’ll explore “Love Is More Than A Feeling” and what that really means.

You can learn more about The Sacred Women’s Circle series on my website.

Check out my Windtree Press author page.

Follow me on Twitter: @JudithAshley19

I’m also on Facebook

© 2016 Judith Ashley

Glasser Wisdom – All Behavior is Purposeful by Judith Ashley

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic fiction that honors spiritual traditions that nurture the soul. She is also on the Senior Teaching Faculty of The William Glasser Institute.

Dr. William Glasser first came to notice in the 1960’s due to his work at the Ventura School for Girls and the back wards of the V.A. Hospital in Los Angeles. I heard of Dr. Glasser in the late 60’s but it was 1978 before I took my first Basic Intensive Training. To learn more about this remarkable man’s life, I encourage you to read “Champion of Choice” by Jim Roy.

What I’m going to talk about over the next month or so is the impact Dr. Glasser and his concepts have on my life. Yes, “have”.

My tag line for my Glasser work is “Your Choices Today Create Your Tomorrow.”

Break that down to the title of this post “All Behavior is Purposeful.”

That translates to everything you do is your effort to create something for yourself.

As you start to argue that isn’t true for you, I encourage you to stop a moment and take a look at what you are going to use as an argument against that concept.

Deep breath.

What exactly is it that you are putting forth? Describe it in what you were doing, what you were thinking at the time, how you physically felt in that moment and what was going on in your body? When you have that clear in your mind, what did you want to happen with that choice?

My guess is that you wanted someone or something else to be different. Perhaps you wanted your child to stop whining. Or maybe your dog to “come”? Your boss to say “thank you” after you worked extra hard to finish the project on time. It could be that other drivers were more polite or perhaps it’s just customers in general if you deal with them daily.

And, that someone could be you. What was it you wanted to do that you didn’t?

An example from my own recent life:

I’ve had on my list to make dental and dermatology appointments since the end of last year. It is now August. Most weeks I wrote on my weekly list “Make appointments”. I made other appointments in the meantime but not dermatology or dental. It may seem like a simple task. Pick up the phone and make the call—however, I didn’t have a dentist or a dermatologist to call. Before I could make the appointments I first had to find a provider that took my insurance.

Some of you are rolling your eyes at my procrastination or whatever you call it.

What’s important to note—All Behavior Is Purposeful. So what was I gaining (positive) by not moving forward?

I’m on the computer for hours a day but I’m writing. I’m not someone who clicks around on the computer searching for much of anything. Also, I really, really, really do not like to go through the telephone tree and listen to all the commercials for the company in order to talk to a customer service person. (The commercial of the guy saying “customer service” over and over? I’m laughing and crying at the same time-been there too many times).

What I gained from not moving forward was I didn’t have to deal with telephone trees, computer automated systems, waiting for minutes to talk to a real person, much less clicking around on the computer. So that was the “purpose” behind my procrastination.

The scales tipped when I calculated the amount of money I’d spent on dental insurance so far this year. And by the time you read this, I will have seen my new dentist!

We make choices to support ourselves and to support others. We also make choices in our efforts to control others. More about that next week.

Judith

You can learn more about The Sacred Women’s Circle series on my website.

Check out my Windtree Press author page.

Follow me on Twitter: @JudithAshley19

I’m also on Facebook 

© 2016 Judith Ashley

Intend Kindness: Support Other's Passion

Staying with the “Intend Kindness” theme of the past two weeks, I’ve one more suggestion along those lines.

Intend kindness by showing support to others who are manifesting their passion.

It may be a published author whose books you’ve read. Write a Review.

It may be a friend who is excited about an idea. Listen.

It may be a non-profit fund raiser for a cause you believe in. Share the News!

For several different reasons, I’ve had time to read this year. Here is a list of the books I’ve enjoyed and certainly recommend!!!

Paty Jager

The Halsey Brothers’ series

Secrets of a Mayan Moon (An Isabella Mumphrey mystery)

Double Duplicity (A Shandra Higheagle mystery)

Peggy Bird

Sparked by Love

Tracy Weber

Murder Strikes a Pose

Delilah Marvelle

Romancing Lady Stone

Christy Carlyle

Whitechapel Wagers series

Jim Roy

Champion of Choice

Stephen Skinner

Sacred Geometry

Susan Pesznecker

The Magickal Retreat: Making Time for Solitude, Intention and Rejuvenation

How am I following through with the other two suggestions?

I’m supporting a wonderful woman who has single handed started a non-profit “Beading the Odds” that works with juvenile males, teaching them how to bead. This has been life-changing for several of the young men because they are successful, develop a camaraderie with a caring non-staff adult and each other outside the regular routine of incarcerated life.

November 7 – 8 the Bead Society is hosting a Bead Bazaar in Portland, OR. Even if you aren’t a beader, think about stopping by and checking out the fantastic work of these young men. Meet Juanita and see passion at work.

Judith Ashley is the author of The Sacred Women’s Circle series, romantic fiction that honors spiritual practices that nurture the soul.

You can find Judith on Twitter: JudithAshley19

Check out Judith’s website here; her Windtree Press author page here.