Mind Matters: Be direct and celebrate the ‘No’

Posted by Dr. Kayta Gajdos on February 20, 2013

No matter how old we are, life and its concerns continue. I consult at a local retirement community where I meet with the residents individually.

An issue that arose recently for one grandly elegant 89-year-old woman has probably been her lifelong theme. And that is, how to be direct in asserting her desires, wishes, wants, even needs. Recently, she had been visiting her daughter and had wanted to go to church. I ask, “Did you ask, directly stating what you wanted?” “No.” she replied.

This woman is not alone in her avoidance of being direct in communicating with others. Most of us do this occasionally, but some of us do it per forma, almost as a given.

Early on in our childhoods perhaps we learned that we were not allowed to make requests or even to have a feeling. We may have been told, “You’re not angry,” even after we said we were. As we age, the shutdown not only of what we want to ask for but also of how we feel remains. When we shut down feelings, not only our mental health, but our physical health gets affected. Shutdown of healthy expression of feelings is one big superhighway to stress. And stress is bio-physical. There is stress also when we don’t make our requests directly known. We may develop an attitude that others must mind read us, and when they don’t, we may get angry. But because we don’t express anger outright with a healthy, “I am angry about…,” we let the anger devolve into bitterness and resentment.

So if making a direct request is so important for our mental and physical health, why do we avoid it? Perhaps we are afraid to hear “No” just as much as we are afraid to say “No.” With either “no” is the fear of rejection and ultimately abandonment. If we play nice-nice and don’t ask, maybe we’ll get what we want and not be rejected.

How misguided we are. The mother of family therapy, Virginia Satir, used to talk about the congruent person. This is the person who could honestly acknowledge his/her feelings and express them healthily, with no harm to self or other. This is the person who could be direct in communication with another and make a request without fear of abandonment. This is the person who could also celebrate the “No” response as a sign that he/she made the request, and that directness is to be celebrated rather than avoided.

Of course, direct communication is best when it follows certain guidelines. In a Buddhist retreat, we were reminded that, for speech to be “right,” it must be true, necessary, said kindly, and at the proper time.

What does all this mean? I consider it to mean that we speak our own truth in a way that is respectful of the other and at a time when we are calm enough to be speaking without reactivity or malice. In other words, not in the heat of the moment, but in a “debriefing” time after the reflexive lizard brain has gone to rest, allowing the frontal cortex to speak with “heart in mind.” That’s congruence, whether we are 9 or 89.

* Kayta Curzie Gajdos holds a doctorate in counseling psychology and is in private practice in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania. She welcomes comments at MindMatters@DrGajdos.com or 610-388-2888. Past columns are posted to www.drgajdos.com.

About Kayta Gajdos

Dr. Kathleen Curzie Gajdos ("Kayta") is a licensed psychologist (Pennsylvania and Delaware) who has worked with individuals, couples, and families with a spectrum of problems. She has experience and training in the fields of alcohol and drug addictions, hypnosis, family therapy, Jungian theory, Gestalt therapy, EMDR, and bereavement. Dr. Gajdos developed a private practice in the Pittsburgh area, and was affiliated with the Family Therapy Institute of Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, having written numerous articles for the Family Therapy Newsletter there. She has published in the American Psychological Association Bulletin, the Family Psychologist, and in the Swedenborgian publications, Chrysalis and The Messenger. Dr. Gajdos has taught at the college level, most recently for West Chester University and Wilmington College, and has served as field faculty for Vermont College of Norwich University the Union Institute's Center for Distance Learning, Cincinnati, Ohio. She has also served as consulting psychologist to the Irene Stacy Community MH/MR Center in Western Pennsylvania where she supervised psychologists in training. Currently active in disaster relief, Dr. Gajdos serves with the American Red Cross and participated in Hurricane Katrina relief efforts as a member of teams from the Department of Health and Human Services' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.Now living in Chadds Ford, in the Brandywine Valley of eastern Pennsylvania, Dr. Gajdos combines her private practice working with individuals, couples and families, with leading workshops on such topics as grief and healing, the impact of multigenerational grief and trauma shame, the shadow and self, Women Who Run with the Wolves, motherless daughters, and mediation and relaxation. Each year at Temenos Retreat Center in West Chester, PA she leads a griefs of birthing ritual for those who have suffered losses of procreation (abortions, miscarriages, infertility, etc.); she also holds yearly A Day of Re-Collection at Temenos.Dr. Gajdos holds Master's degrees in both philosophy and clinical psychology and received her Ph.D. in counseling at the University of Pittsburgh. Among her professional affiliations, she includes having been a founding member and board member of the C.G. Jung Educational Center of Pittsburgh, as well as being listed in Who's Who of American Women. Currently, she is a member of the American Psychological Association, The Pennsylvania Psychological Association, the Delaware Psychological Association, the American Family Therapy Academy, The Association for Death Education and Counseling, and the Delaware County Mental Health and Mental Retardation Board. Woven into her professional career are Dr. Gajdos' pursuits of dancing, singing, and writing poetry.