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Welcome to episode 203 of The Non-Anxious Leader Podcast. I'm Jack Shitama, and in today's episode, I'm going back to my new favorite source for family systems theory. That is Dr. Kathleen Smith, who's on the faculty of the Bowen Center for the Study of the Family at Georgetown University. She also has a feed on substant called The Anxious Overachiever. I will post a link to the article that spawned today's episode. It's called minding the gaps in our own maturity. In my mind, Smith is equating maturity with self-differentiation, and she creates what she calls a maturity scavenger hunt that is, looking for ways that we are actually acting in mature ways or ways that we aren't, so that we can grow more mature, we can grow more self-differentiated. So without further ado, here is episode two, three eight signs that you are not self-differentiating. The first sign that you are not self-differentiating is when you avoid people that you need to move closer to, that you need to move toward rather than away. This happens when you fear what will happen if you try to stay connected in a healthy way to the other.

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Perhaps you've self defined and you feel that a reactive response is coming and so you distance yourself. Or perhaps you are worried about moving closer to an important goal that you have as an individual or a leader, and you know that there are anxious people who are resisting. Now, the wisdom here is counterintuitive. Moving closer to anxious people while avoiding a conflict of wills will actually reduce their anxiety and the anxiety in the system. It may not happen immediately, as there may be sabotage, but if you can remain a nonanxious presence, the anxiety in the system will reduce. I find the first step in dealing with this type of immaturity is to pray for the anxious people. When you pray for somebody, it helps to humanize them in your mind and grow your compassion for them despite how they may be treating you. Once you have started praying for people for whom you'd like to really disconnect, then prepare yourself for how you will move closer. How can you maintain a welldefined nonanxious stand? What can you do to avoid a conflict of wills? What will come up when you first do this in terms of the others reactive or adaptive response?

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Once you've answered these questions, think through a script that will help you say what you want to say that enables you to connect with people outside of the content of the situation and will help you to connect with the other person in ways that will help them emotionally. I find the best way to do this is to try to get off of the content of the resistance and get to what is going on with the other person. How are you doing? How are you feeling? What's going on with your family? What's going on with the transition in your life? The more you can get to what is happening with the other person outside of the content of whatever you have done to self differentiate, the easier it will be to move closer and the healthier you will find the relationship becomes. Even when you have a script, you won't likely execute it perfectly, but it will give you a much better chance of staying connected in a healthy way as you move closer to people who are anxious and who make you feel anxious. The second sign that you are not differentiating is when you are not honest with others about how long a task will take.

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This is a form of adaptivity. Instead of being able to selfdefinition in a nonaxious way, you just give in and say you can get it done on time or you try to avoid the conversation altogether. The most important thing you can do in situations like this is self regulate. Create a pause that enables you to think about what's going on inside you and ask yourself, what makes it difficult for me to be honest in this situation? It doesn't necessarily hurt to have a go to phrase such as I'll do the best I can, but I'm concerned about meeting the deadline. This doesn't say you won't meet the deadline, but it doesn't say you will and it does buy you some time. If you actually don't know how you can get it done by the deadline, you can say something like I won't be able to get it done by X, but I can get it done by Y. Will that work for you in the end? If you need to defer your decision, that's even better. Say something like I would like some time to think about this, so how about if I get back to you in 48 hours?

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This will give you time to think clearly about what you want to say and how you're going to say it, and it will give you a better chance of self-differentiating. The third time that you are not self-differentiation is actually two things that Smith mentions in her article, but I'm going to combine them as one seeking approval from others rather than evaluating yourself first and or asking others for reassurance or affirmation even before you work to manage your own anxiety first. Both of these situations are a form of dependency. It is seeking affirmation from others instead of managing and taking responsibility for self. I will say that if this is a go to for you, you will not likely recognize it before you do it, at least early on. So in the meantime, what you want to do is work to recognize this after you've already done it. Remind yourself that those you go to for affirmation are more likely to tell you what you want to hear rather than to self-define and give you honest feedback. Once you start to recognize the emotional process involved with this, you can be more aware. You can work to recognize what it feels like to feel uncertain and to need affirmation from others.

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Then, when you encounter that feeling in a real life situation, you can remind yourself this is not taking responsibility for self and say, what would self-differentiation look like? You will get it wrong more than you get it right, at least early on. But just being able to recognize this type of dependency will help you to become more responsible for self. The fourth sign that you are not self-differentiating is acting in ways that conflict with your principles as a leader, as a parent, as a spouse or friend, etc. It's likely that you've heard me talk about Stephen Covey's concept of integrity in the moment of choice. Integrity is when we act in accordance with our principles, values and goals. When you can do this while staying emotionally connected, you are self-differentiating. You also know what this doesn't look like. Instead of taking a well-defined, nonanxious stand, you react defensively or argumentatively or you just give in. You adapt. The higher the perceived emotional stakes and or the higher the anxiety of the others, the harder it will be to self-differentiate to act with integrity in the moment of choice. The good news is you can do this.

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You can self-differentiate. It's all about self-regulation and creating a pause which increases the gap between stimulus and response. I have found that self-regulation is like a muscle. The more you do it, the stronger you get and the easier it becomes to actually pause and not respond immediately. One principle that is very helpful to me is the idea that an immediate response is something that I require in my head. It's my perception, but it's not really required in most situations. People often appreciate the fact that you're being thoughtful and take time to give a response. And even if they aren't appreciative of it, especially if they aren't taking more time, gives you a chance to get a hold of yourself so that you can understand what's going on inside and be intentional about how you respond. This is how you align your goals and values with your actions and responses. The fifth sign that you are not self-differentiation is when you forget to calm yourself down first, when somebody else is anxious and upset. Again, this is letting your automatic response take over instead of creating a gap between stimulus and response. One way to develop self regulation as your default response is to start doing it in less anxious situations, even the situations where you know how you want to respond.

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If you learn to pause and reflect on what's going on inside of you, you will make it more likely that you will do this in more anxious situations. To me, this is like any form of mastery that takes practice, such as learning a musical instrument or developing skills in a particular sport. It is the constant repetition in nonperformance situations that builds the skill, builds the mastery. And learning to self-regulate is like this. It is muscle memory. It is a skill that you can develop. The 6th sign that you are not self-differentiation is when you automatically over function for others. When stress is high. This occurs when you have a low tolerance for the pain of another. Instead of allowing them to work through their own pain and develop resilience, you take responsibility for them and over function. Now, if you've followed me for a while, you know that this actually has the opposite effect. Not only does this make them less responsible, but it makes them less capable of responding to challenge. I know I sound like a broken record, but again, it's about creating a pause where you can reflect on what's going on in you and what makes it difficult for you to allow the other to experience pain.

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If you can create that pause, if you can selfregulate, it will help you to get a handle on your over functioning. Also remember that Murray Bowen said that anxiety is not distributed fairly in any relationship system. So it is likely that unless you are an extreme over functioner, you don't always feel the need to over function. It's just with certain people there will be times when it's easier for you to let another experience their own pain. And so being able to distinguish between those different relationships will help you to identify what is it about the relationship with another that decreases your tolerance for their pain? What is it that's going on inside of you that makes it difficult for you to let them take responsibility for self? This is usually a function of caring too much. It's a function of too much emotional intensity. And the way to work through that is to work through your own anxiety, to learn to understand what it is about yourself that is making this difficult. So that when you pause, you can give yourself a better chance to not over function. The 7th sign that you are not self-differentiating is actually the opposite.

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It is pretending that you are less capable. When stress is high, instead of over functioning, you actually under function. This is what dependency looks like. It's not taking responsibility for self and it's playing the victim or exhibiting helplessness in the hopes that somebody will step in and over function for you. It's important to distinguish between this type of immaturity and actually asking somebody for help, which can be self-differentiated. A mature and self-differentiated response would be something like I'm struggling with this and would like you to help me to work through it. On the other hand, statements like I can't do this, I'll never be able to do this, I'm not good at anything. Hoping that another will step in and lift you up is acting dependently. Self-differentiated people are not selfsufficient, but they also are able to express when they need help from others. Whether you are able to pause and reflect in the situation or if you do it after the fact, you can ask yourself how capable do I feel in this type of situation? If the answer is not varied, then ask what's going on here? How can I ask for help in a healthy way?

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If you are feeling capable and you're still acting dependently, you're still under functioning, then you want to ask what's going on inside of me that makes me want to ask. This is usually going to be done in reflection after the fact and if you can do it in the moment, that's great. But this is likely rooted in some patterns of response that were formed while you were very young in response to challenging situations. So this is something that's going to take a while to unwind and work through so that you can respond differently regardless. The key here is to be able to avoid responding automatically so you can get in touch with the emotional process that is going on within you. Not in the situation, not with the other, but within you. Remember, it's process not content. And finally, the 8th sign that you are not self-differentiating is when you don't speak up in important situations because you don't want to upset others. This is a form of adaptation in which you are avoiding self-definition because you're worried about the response of others. The interesting thing here is that you don't really know how people are going to react in some situations.

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You might have a pretty good idea, but people can often surprise you, especially if you can express yourself in a healthy way. So the key here is to figure out what it means to take a nonanxious well-defined stand, that is to self-define while staying emotionally connected. I find it helpful to have some phrases in my pocket that I can use in the moment when somebody else is feeling anxious. I'm feeling anxious, but I need to take a stand. I need to say what I believe even while I'm staying connected. So here are four that I think are helpful. One is I'd like to offer a different perspective. Another you don't have to agree with me. But a third I may be wrong about this, but and the fourth I'm not sure how I feel about this. I'd like some time to think about it. The last one is a deferral, it's putting things off, but at least you're not giving in. At least it's going to give you time to craft a response. And I think that should be a go to if you aren't able to actually self define in the moment at least, you can say to somebody else, I need some time to think about this, so that you're not giving in.

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Better yet, when you know that you're going into anxious situations where you're more likely to adapt, then you can prepare how you'd like to respond. You can use some of these go to statements to craft a way to take a well-defined nonanxious stand. You can also use this time of preparation to craft responses when somebody reacts defensively or argumentatively when they are trying to get into a conflict of wills, which you want to be able to avoid. Which leads to the main recommendation that Smith makes in how to become more responsible for self how to become more mature, how to become more self-differentiated in those anxious moments. And that is to take time every day to think about how you can be more responsible for yourself. This can include formal activities such as meditation or journaling, or more informal activities like spending time to reflect during exercise or your commute to and from work. Whatever amount of time you can spend doing this type of reflection and preparation will help you to, first of all, self-regulation in those anxious moments, and secondly, to respond with integrity in the moment of choice. This is what nonanxious leaders do.

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That's it for episode 203. You can get the show notes at thenonanxiousleader.com/203. You can sign up for my weekly Two for Tuesday newsletter, where I give two recommendations on how to be a nonanxious leader. And you can always email me at jack@christian-leaders.com. Until next time. Thanks and goodbye.