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Welcome to Episode 240 of the Non-Anxious Leader Podcast. I'm Jack Shitama, and we are going to get right into today's episode. Edwin Friedmann once said that he had a bias towards encouraging challenge and not comfort. It's not that he didn't care. In his view, caring actually meant letting others grow by facing their own challenges. I should also note that I interpret comfort to helping others to avoid the pain of their challenge rather than helping them take responsibility for self. The impetus for this episode is an opinion piece by David Brooks, Hey America, grow up from the NewYork Times. A shout out to Dave, who is a member of the Non-Anxious Leader Network and who also is one of the leaders of the free book study that we run on my book, If You Met My Family, you'd understand.

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I will put a link to the article in the show notes, although I don't know if you will hit a paywall because it is from The New York Times. Brooks notes in his opinion piece that following World War II, a phenomenon known as therapeutic culture arose. He writes, quote, In earlier cultural epochs, many people derived their self-worth from their relationship with God or from their ability to be a winner in the commercial marketplace. But in a therapeutic culture, people's sense of self-worth depends on their subjective feelings about themselves. Do I feel good about myself? Do I like me? It's important to note that this subjective sense of self-worth is different than self-definition. Developing a sense of self in a vacuum, using subjective feelings without any connection to larger things is not self-definition. Self-definition is about knowing your own goals and values, and this in itself does not develop self-worth. Knowing your own goals and values comes from being connected to something larger than yourself. This can be faith in God. It can be wanting to raise a family. It can be wanting to make a meaningful impact in the world. It can even mean wanting to have the biggest company in the world.

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The main thing is having a sense of connection to something larger than self and being able to envision moving into a preferred future. It's this type of abstract thinking that makes human beings unique. When my kids were in elementary school, they were taught a song that went something like, I like myself, I'm worth a lot. It was part of the whole self-esteem movement. I didn't disagree with it, but as I look back, I see that this was the epitome of therapeutic culture. And while I believe that one sacred worth as a human being created by God is in itself a source of self-esteem, I also believe that self-esteem grows when one faces challenge successfully or unsuccessfully. As a person of faith, I believe this involves a balance between taking responsibility for self and relying on God's grace. Brooks uses the term maturity in this article, and it's a term that is often used by Bowen Family Systems practitioners. I think of maturity and self differentiation as synonymous. A mature person takes responsibility for self, expresses their own goals and values in a healthy way and knows that healthy emotional connection is essential to wellbeing of self and the relationship system.

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The problem with therapeutic culture is that it not only removed self from any form of healthy spiritual connection or meaningful challenge, it went to the extreme in encouraging comfort. Brooks notes, quote, Before long, safetyism was on the march. This is the assumption that people are so fragile, they need to be protected from social harm. The problem is the cuddling approach turned out to be counterproductive. It was based on a series of false ideas that ended up hurting the people it was trying to help. End quote. What Brooks is saying is that by emphasizing comfort over challenge, therapeutic culture backfired. Protecting people from challenge is disempowering. It undermines resilience and makes people less capable. One of the most helpful things I found in Brooks' opinion piece is the citation of Greg, Lucianoff, and Jonathan Haid's book, The Coddling of the American Mind, in which they describe three bad ideas or three false ideas that took hold in American culture. The first idea is that what doesn't kill you makes you weaker. This has the effect of getting people to consider the wounds of their past as debilitating. Instead of pain and challenge building emotional strength, they encourage a victim's mindset.

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When I work with coaching clients, we'll often do a genogram to work through the emotional patterns and intergenerational transmission that have formed who they are. The point of this is to help them to understand what's behind their own functioning without blaming themselves or others. This is the opposite of playing the victim, and in reality, what didn't kill them can make them stronger. The second false or bad idea is the idea that I am a thing to whom things happen. With this approach, the person who has experienced trauma is cast as a passive victim who is unable to control their own life. They are defined by their suffering and a lack of agency. Again, this is antithetically to family systems theory, which teaches that the only thing one can control is their own functioning. It's all about taking responsibility for self and developing a sense of agency. This doesn't mean one operates in a vacuum, but healthy functioning balances one's own goals and values with the need for healthy emotional connection. Instead of feeling like a victim, a person who is working on their own differentiation, realizes that the only thing they can do is lean into the challenge in a way that will help them to grow, regardless of how successfully they are able to respond to the challenge.

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The gain comes in the process, in the effort, not in the outcome. Finally, the third bad idea is, if I keep you safe, you will be strong. As Brooks notes, the overprotective parenting, overprotective school systems don't produce resilient children. They produce less resilient ones. This is the epitome of encouraging comfort over challenge. I recall going to a parent-teacher conference once when one of my children was being disruptive in class. The teacher was only a year or two out of college and I think was a bit intimidated about having to meet with me. When I sat down, I asked, What can I do to help in this situation? I think he was taken aback because it took him a moment to respond. I later realized that he was used to parents challenging him and saying it was him, not their child that was the problem. Likewise, one of my children once complained, Why do you always believe the teacher and not me? I don't remember my response, but it had something to do with the fact that the teacher was an adult that had some maturity and you kid need to learn from them. Perhaps that wasn't the best response, but it certainly wasn't encouraging comfort over challenge.

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The question is, if the therapeutic culture encourages comfort over challenge, how do we flip the script? You'll not be surprised that my answer to how to respond to therapeutic culture is self-differentiation. Whether it's in our family, workplace, school, school or congregation, a self-differentiated, non-anxious leader can flip the script. When people play the victim, a non-anxious leader shows caring and concern, that is, stays emotionally connected without actually bailing them out. In short, you can be a non-anxious presence, and it can make a difference. Brooks writes, quote, "mature people are calm amid the storm because their perception lets them see the present challenges from a long term vantage. They know that feeling crappy about yourself sometimes is a normal part of life. They are considerate to and gracious towards others because they can see situations from multiple perspectives. They can withstand the setbacks because they have pointed their life towards some concrete moral goal". End quote. Mature people are self-differentiated because they have taken the time to reflect on what matters to them and connected to something larger than themselves, and through that have been able to clarify their own goals and values. They don't operate in a vacuum because they know that emotional connection is important, which involves being able to see things from the perspective of another person, even as they don't over function, even as they don't try to bail them out, even as they only take responsibility for self.

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And they have grit, they have passion combined with perseverance, because they are focused on finding that preferred future, moving forward into the future, even when others want to resist, even when others want to sabotage. You can help people grow through their pain by increasing your tolerance for their pain. I often say that letting others work through their pain while staying emotionally connected is the greatest gift you can give someone. They will grow stronger and more resilient. And what will happen is the system itself, whether that's a family, a congregation, a workplace, or an organization, will grow stronger as well. That's the difference you can make as a non-anxious leader. That's it for episode 240. Thanks again to Dave for sending me that article from David Brooks. You can connect with me at the non-anxiousleader. Com, where you can sign up for my two-for-Tuesday newsletter. Every week, I send out some musings on leadership as well as two recommendations on things that I have found helpful as a leader. You can also find the show notes and a transcript at thenon-anxiousleader.com/240, and you can always email me at jack@christian-leaders.com. Until next time, thanks and goodbye.

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