The other day I asked a client how she was doing and right off the bat she started should-ing on
herself. "Well i'm not feeling very well." she said "I'm feeling kind of depressed. But
I should be happy because things are going fine." she said "I mean, I shouldn't feel so down" she said.
"And I've got so much to do with the new baby and with my job. I should be spending more time
with him and I should be working harder and I should be more grateful that I have a job at all."
And she went on and on until I stopped her. She wasn't sure why she was feeling depressed
that week neither was I, but I can absolutely tell you something that was making it worse:
shoulding on herself. Psychiatrist Karen Horney was among the first to notice a common pattern among
people who felt guilty depressed and anxious they constantly said "I should" and so she called
it the tyranny of the should. So here are some examples of what shoulding sounds like:
I should be able to solve every problem quickly and easily. I shouldn't feel this way I should
never need a rest. I should never make mistakes. I should be totally self-reliant. The world should
be fair. My life shouldn't be like this. He should be more responsible. Strawberries should be cheaper
than french fries. I should be exercising more. I should spend more time with my kids. Now a should
statement is a cognitive distortion. It's based on an overly rigid rule inside your head that
you aren't able to live up to. Shoulds generate a lot of shame. This way of talking to ourselves
is like having a little shoulder angel constantly finding fault and criticizing you. But shoulds just
aren't that helpful in actually creating change they mostly just make us miserable and discouraged.
Now if we're striving to live good lives we will always desire to be a little better than we are.
We will always wish for more time or energy or ability to do a little more or be a little better.
We'll often make mistakes. This is normal this is healthy it sometimes hurts but that's also a
good thing the only way to not feel bad when we mess up is to try to stop caring about our life
purpose and to give up on our dreams. Unfortunately this desire to be better when paired with our
human nature our fallible nature can turn into a dangerous pattern of should-ing all over ourselves.
A desire to be kind gets warped into "I shouldn't ever say no" a desire to help turns into "I should
be able to fix everyone's problems. When we leave piles of should everywhere in our lives it's easy
to become discouraged, overwhelmed, and feel like a shouldy person. Should-ing is a bad habit that
sends a message to your brain that you'll never be good enough. It creates hopelessness which
leads to depression. So how do we stop shooting on ourselves in order to resolve these shitty
feelings we're going to use the emotion processing model notice pause explore clarify and act
so the two shows we're gonna look at for our example are number one i should always be happy
and number two i should spend more time with my kids so first notice right start by catching
yourself doing it you could decide that i should is a swear word and make a swear jar you could ask
a friend or family member to call you out when you say i should or you could write down some
of your shoulds you could make a big list of them don't filter them you might need another page or
if you're like me a couple of pages so depending on your list you might have to just work through
one or two of them at a time okay second pause practice acceptance and compassion
even for yourself let's just start where we're at so even if you don't want to be feeling this way
you are feeling this way acceptance just means acknowledging reality in the present
moment it doesn't mean you have to feel this way forever sometimes when we stop
resisting how we feel we give ourselves a chance to actually resolve how we feel or for example if
you think oh my kids shouldn't be acting this way my my boss shouldn't act this way it just makes
you feel angry and resentful so instead say oh my child is acting this way what will i do about
it or my boss isn't perfect what actions will i take stop putting so much energy into resisting
reality and instead shift your focus to what you can change instead okay number three explore your
shoulds so what do you notice about them what rules or values do these shoulds come from so
for example there's some ideas out there like oh men should never cry women should never get angry
you should always be positive so to explore these underlying rules one way to one way to explore
this is by filling in the blank a good blank should and then fill that blank in with your roles
uh you're being a son a good son should a parent a good parent should a good worker should a good
christian should et cetera et cetera so put your roles into that space and see if you can figure
out what those shoulds are and where they came from and then explore them some more are these
rules truthful are they helpful are they realistic are they distorted are they demanding are they
crippling would you say them to a friend how do these rules make you feel do they motivate you
ask yourself the question why should i explore the reason behind the sheds where are these rules
coming from in her course on improving self-esteem dr carly lebaron walks you through a process of
exploring the rule behind your shoulds so for example behind the i should always be happy is
the rule that you're not allowed to have feelings or you're not allowed to make others uncomfortable
now when i believe these rules they make me feel worse when i'm down
do they help you how about the other example behind that i should spend more time with my kids
is the idea oh i need to be a perfect parent i must entertain my kids 100 of the time
or i really value my kids and i want them to feel loved now the first two
rules make me feel never good enough and the third rule is a little bit more motivating
so just ask yourself do these shoulds help me live my values do they help me live a rich and
meaningful life okay number four is clarify so we're gonna split these shoulds into two
categories the i could category and the i will category so first we're gonna talk about the i
could category so we're taking this i should spend more time with my kids and we're gonna say i could
spend more time with my kids i could take a break so that i'm a more engaged parent i could try to
be happy all the time but that would be exhausting i could accept my feelings as they come and go
even if i am feeling down i could still treat myself kindly um i could practice gratitude
so basically with koods we just toss out a bunch of options so we can choose which one
will be most helpful or useful for you now this is really different from an i should statement
i should is really rigid it's the only right thing and it creates an emotional reaction of just not
being good enough but when we have options we have the freedom to choose to act on our values
not on whatever our brain is telling us we should be doing so as we clarify all these options
what do you really value which of these options seems to line up with your best self which option
might be the most helpful to you in the long run and number five is act focus your energy
and your attention on the action you choose the action you choose is the i will so choose which
of these thoughts is going to be most helpful for you and let go of the rules that aren't helpful
write down a few small actions you'll take so for example um for my client she might say i'll
be gentle with myself and with my emotions or instead of saying i should spend more time with
my kids she could say i will take a break and then i'll come back and wrestle with my kids
so when my client started to recognize how the shitty thinking pattern was making her feel worse
how it wasn't helping her to get motivated she started to say i don't really like feeling down
right now but that is how i feel and that's okay because emotions come and go and then she'd ask
oh well what action can i take and usually it was either choose to take a little rest
and be gentle with herself or just take one small action towards mental health like just going for a
walk around the block or calling a friend to talk so instead of being stuck in the oh i shouldn't
feel this way purgatory she freed herself to take a little more action and to be a little
bit more compassionate with herself over time she developed a better relationship with herself
and with her emotions and her depression gradually lifted for all of you out there i hope you can
start noticing your shoulds and replacing them with something that's more helpful for you
how would your life be if you weren't dragging a bag of should everywhere you go
anyway i hope this video is helpful i hope you can learn to stop shooting on yourself thank you for
watching and take care did you know that you can give a course to someone you care about the other
day a young man told me that he bought the emotion processing course and gave it to his father
and that his father was actually taking it and learning all kinds of things to improve
his emotional health self-improvement is a lasting meaningful gift to yourself or others
i've got a dozen mental health courses that can help people with issues from anxiety and
depression to self-esteem and intrusive thoughts it's easy to sign yourself up
or if you want to give a course to someone else you just sign up with their email address
and create a password for them and voila they have access to the course for christmas and
through the new year you can use the code mary to get 30 off any course for yourself or a loved one
you