Tag Archives: Necessary Endings

Adoption, Aging, All Good Gifts, Attitude, Babies & Children, Bookmarked Summer, Books, Character, Communication, Community, Contentment, Conversations, Daughters and Sons, Family, Finishing Strong, Food & Drink, Friday Faves, God, Grace, Growing up, Guitar, Habits, Healing, Home, Kindness, Leadership, Legacy, Lessons Learned, Life Skills, Love, Love Your Neighbor, Music, Parenting, Purpose in Life, Redeeming & Restoring, Relationships, Remembering, Resilience, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving or Gratefulness

5 Friday Faves – Beyond the Guitar Nostalgia, Parents & Adult Children, Welcome to Holland, Food Fit for Memory-Making, and Boundaries that Define Us

Leave a comment

This week’s Friday Faves – GO!

1) Beyond the Guitar Nostalgia – How about all the feels from musical themes of favorite old movies? That’s what happens for us when Nathan arranges and performs themes from films we love.

While he takes a brief hiatus from his usual YouTube channel to focus on other work, only we Patreon subscribers get to hear the latest (subscribe). He is creating some new instructional content which makes me want to learn classical guitar. In this bit of time in the interim, I decided to highlight some of his arrangements already appreciated by 500k-plus YouTube subscribers. Enjoy. Oh, and comment below a favorite song of yours that he arranges/performs.

YouTube Video – The Last of the Mohicans: Promentory – Classical Guitar Cover

YouTube Video – How to Train Your Dragon – Romantic Flight (Classical Guitar Cover)

YouTube Video – Pure Imagination (Willy Wonka) – Classical Guitar Cover

YouTube Video – The Lion King Main Theme (“This Land”) on Guitar

YouTube Video – Amazing Grace Meets Classical Guitar (Epic Version) – this one Nathan did as a request from his mom and dad. So beautiful. Thanks again, Nae.

2) Parents & Adult Children – If we have grandchildren, then we have adult children. Loving them both in ways they understand is a crucial part of our life journey. This week I came across 3 excellent and empowering articles by author, counselor Dennis Rainey. If you want to parent adult children well, these articles have wise and applicable counsel for you. You adult children might enjoy them as well. The articles are linked below along with a couple of others that are also treasures.  https://debmillswriter.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/2012-December-family-snapshot-014.jpg

Sometimes, we can be hard on our adult children. Too many demands or expectations.  I’m sure I’m not alone with bringing my own vision into the present of what our family would look like, all grown-up with little ones. To be honest, they can also be hard on us (without even realizing it). However, what’s more important? The people in these relationships! Full-stop. Our kids have their own sharp learning curves of life without pressure from mom and dad to bend in our direction. It’s enough to see them when we can and cheer them on in their own new life configurations. If they make choices we would not make…it doesn’t change the love. Remember they also deal with the choices we make.

Read the articles. You’ll be glad you did.

“Life is a pilgrimage of learning, a voyage of discovery, in which our mistaken views are corrected, our distorted notions adjusted, our shallow opinions deepened and some of our vast ignorances diminished.” – John Stott

3) Welcome to Holland – This goes out to you who are parents, siblings, extended family or friends of children/adults with special needs or medical complexities. A friend introduced me this week to   “Welcome to Holland”, a beautiful essay by Emily Perl Kingsley. My friend has a medically complex child, and so did I.

“Did” only because he is grown now. When he was little, he had major struggles and still has some of the aftermath of those struggles and always will.

When Dan came home to us through adoption, we knew he would have his challenges, but you’re never prepared for the twists and turns of that through childhood and into adulthood. With all the trips to doctors and therapists, meetings with teachers, and one-on-one times with him as the topic, there was still his joy that kept us marveling at this wonder.

He was an incredibly exuberant kid and seemed far less bothered by his struggles than we were.

A friend, years ago, asked us, regarding Dan, “What’s it like to have a ticker tape parade thrown for you, every time he sees you?”

It was something very special.

So…welcome to Holland.

Welcome To Holland

by Emily Perl Kingsley

Copyright©1987 by Emily Perl Kingsley. 

All rights reserved. 

Reprinted by permission of the author.

 

I am often asked to describe the experience of raising a child with a disability – to try to help people who have not shared that unique experience to understand it, to imagine how it would feel.  It’s like this……

 

When you’re going to have a baby, it’s like planning a fabulous vacation trip – to Italy.  You buy a bunch of guide books and make your wonderful plans.  The Coliseum.  The Michelangelo David.  The gondolas in Venice.  You may learn some handy phrases in Italian.  It’s all very exciting.

 

After months of eager anticipation, the day finally arrives.  You pack your bags and off you go.  Several hours later, the plane lands. The flight attendant comes in and says, “Welcome to Holland.”

 

“Holland?!?” you say. “What do you mean Holland?? I signed up for Italy!  I’m supposed to be in Italy.  All my life I’ve dreamed of going to Italy.”

 

But there’s been a change in the flight plan.  They’ve landed in Holland and there you must stay.

 

The important thing is that they haven’t taken you to a horrible, disgusting, filthy place, full of pestilence, famine and disease.  It’s just a different place.

 

So you must go out and buy new guide books. And you must learn a whole new language.  And you will meet a whole new group of people you would never have met.

 

It’s just a different place.  It’s slower-paced than Italy, less flashy than Italy.  But after you’ve been there for a while and you catch your breath, you look around…. and you begin to notice that Holland has windmills….and Holland has tulips.  Holland even has Rembrandts.

Pin on WindmillsPhoto Credit: Pinterest

But everyone you know is busy coming and going from Italy… and they’re all bragging about what a wonderful time they had there.  And for the rest of your life, you will say “Yes, that’s where I was supposed to go. That’s what I had planned.”  

 

And the pain of that will never, ever, ever, ever go away… because the loss of that dream is a very very significant loss.

 

But… if you spend your life mourning the fact that you didn’t get to Italy, you may never be free to enjoy the very special, the very lovely things … about Holland.

__________________________________________________________________________

Love you, Dan.

4) Food Fit for Memory-Making – Writing for the last two weeks has been on the back burner. We’ve been traveling, seeing friends, and enjoying great food as part of those experiences. Now that we’re back home, eating to live more than living to eat will have to be restored to the daily.

However, can I just celebrate great food for a moment. The images below take us back, just the last two weeks, to food shared with friends in beautiful spaces. An anniversary was celebrated and Dave got his Butterfinger Blizzard – a twice-a-year indulgence which never disappoints.

My mom’s cooking has settled deep in my memories since she’s been in Heaven for 20 years now. Nothing like her biscuits and gravy, Thanksgiving dinners, and vegetable soup and cornbread. Sweet memories of her and the food she prepared. Memories imprinted by food shared together.

The memories we’ve made recently, accompanied by food, will suffice for now. Bon appétit .

Shyndigz – a local desserterie. Their fresh fruit cake has always been my favorite UNTIL they’ve recently introduced a Tres Leches cake. Once a month it will tempt me for sure…so amazingly good!

5) Boundaries that Define Us – All my adult life, I have struggled with (and been known by) being fuzzy-boundaried. Easy-going, fairly amicable, not very demanding. Then recently, on more than one occasion, friends have asked me about my preferences and desires in life. What do you like to do? What do you want to accomplish these days? How do you fill your day? What are your goals? Hopes? Dreams?

I stuttered…trying to answer. It seems much of my life has been spent bending toward helping, serving, pleasing others…That is NOT a bad thing, but to not be able to come up with answers to the above questions really got me puzzling about my own self-awareness.

Henry Cloud Quote: "That is why success and fruitfulness depend as much ...Photo Credit: Quote Fancy, Dr. Henry Cloud

Presently I’m reading a book that may very well help me get to those answers. It is Dr. Henry Cloud‘s Changes That Heal. His chapter on Boundaries has me stopped in my tracks.

“Boundaries, in a broad sense, are lines or things that mark a limit, or border. In a psychological sense, boundaries are the realization of our own person apart from others. This sense of separateness forms the basis of personal identity. It says what we are and what we are not, what we will choose and what we will not choose, what we will endure and what we will not, what we feel and what we will not feel, what we like and what we do not like, and what we want and what we do not want. Boundaries, in short, define us.”

Being a fuzzy-boundaried sort, I’m not really sure about some of these things, but now I’m on a mission of determining who I am and who I’m not. This may seem a strange venture for someone as old as I am. Hear me out.

Dr. Cloud talks about the various boundaries that make up our identity: physical appearance/body; attitudes; feelings; behavior; thoughts; abilities; desires; choices; limits; and, lastly, negative assertions (who/what we are NOT).

If we don’t know these things about ourselves, then we are bound to bump into, step over, or be drawn into the boundaries of others.

Here’s an example of this: I AM a reconciler, and I AM NOT a grudge-holder. So when my extended family is struggling with a family rift, it’s somewhat confusing for me, and really hard personally. How boundaries come to play in this is that I can’t make this rift go away…my own limits, attitudes, feelings, and desires (among other things) keep me from crossing others’ boundaries…This leaves me feeling hopeless, and sometimes helpless. My alternatives (and they are good ones) are to love my family, encourage those also reeling from this, and praying for all of us.

I can NOT fix it. If my fuzzy-boundaried self insisted on somehow making things better, it would leave me worse for the wear…and the rift still unchanged. We all have boundaries at play in our relationships.

In fact, some boundaries we set up voluntarily by our attitudes and thoughts. When we feel harmed by someone, we impose boundaries to prevent getting hurt again. Are these actual or imagined? It seems the pain continues in the trauma of unforgiveness. I just don’t know. One thing I do know is that this sort of boundary is something I AM NOT willing to do…especially with family. Where does that leave us who disagree on this?

So…forgive all verbal processing on this. Just trying to figure some of this out, and I’m only beginning. Unless you know yourself well, Dr. Cloud’s lesson on boundaries might be an excellent one to consider. One very beautiful extra thought on this: although we are made in God’s image, this is one place we differ from Him. He is infinite, and we are finite. As we get to know ourselves better, we can appreciate Him all the more and depend on Him even more readily for what we need both inside and outside our boundaries.

[This same Dr. Cloud also wrote Necessary Endings and Boundaries.]

___________________________________________________________________________

That’s all for this week. Any comments or thoughts you have, please share below. Blessings on you and thanks for stopping by.

Bonuses:

Road to Wholeness Podcast – Redeeming Heartache

How Do You Move Through Past Trauma? – Interview with Jerry Sittser – Podcast – Adam Young Counseling

Photo Credit: Laugh It’s Free Facebook page

Books on my Summer Reading List

Your Home Affects Your Longevity – Here’s How the Longest-Living People Outfit Their Spaces – Erica Sloan

Addictions, Attending or Focus, Attitude, Books, Brene Brown, Character, Communication, Community, Conversations, Courage, Critical Thinking, Disciplines, Emotions, Family, Film, Finishing Strong, Friday Faves, Grief and Loss, Growing up, Guitar, Habits, Language, Leadership, Life Skills, Love Your Neighbor, Music, Parenting, Productivity, Purpose, Relationships, Time Management, Words, work

5 Friday Faves – Pink Panther on Guitar, Avoiding Dehumanization, the Power of Words and Names, After School Restraint Collapse, and Using a Timer for Work

6 Comments

Welcome to your weekend…unless it’s not. Here are my favorite finds for this week. A couple are longer than others. Pick and choose. Hope it’s helpful.

1) Pink Panther on Guitar – In 1963, The Pink Panther comedy film debuted starring David Niven and Peter Sellers. So popular, it launched a cartoon series, followed by several sequels and a 2-film reboot in the 2000s starring Steve Martin.

YouTube Video – 15 Life Lessons from Peter Sellers – Classical Pink Panther Moments and More

The jazzy theme for Pink Panther was written by American composer Henry Mancini.

Nathan Mills, at Beyond the Guitar, has masterfully arranged and performed the theme. It brings back waves of nostalgia from those films/cartoons. All through my younger years, the Mancini theme was part of high school band performances and jazz dance concerts.

This piece is something altogether different and yet delightfully familiar, at the same time. Enjoy.

Here you go:

2) Avoiding Dehumanization – For some time, the verbal bashing of people in the news and on our own social media has been unsettling for me. Character defamation, name calling, shaming, and blame-shifting are escalating and inflaming.

When we find someone’s speech or behavior inhumane or dehumanizing, how does it help the situation if we call them out by behaving similarly? Does that not put us in a similar camp with the one we consider offensive?

Author, researcher Brené Brown speaks to this much more articulately than I:

“Here’s what I believe:
1. If you are offended or hurt when you hear Hillary Clinton or Maxine Waters called b**ch, wh**e, or the c-word, you should be equally offended and hurt when you hear those same words used to describe Ivanka Trump, Kellyanne Conway, or Theresa May.
3. If you felt belittled when Hillary Clinton called Trump supporters “a basket of deplorables” then you should have felt equally concerned when Eric Trump said “Democrats aren’t even human.”
3. When the president of the United States calls women dogs or talks about grabbing p*ssy, we should get chills down our spine and resistance flowing through our veins. When people call the president of the United States a pig, we should reject that language regardless of our politics and demand discourse that doesn’t make people subhuman.
4. When we hear people referred to as animals or aliens, we should immediately wonder, “Is this an attempt to reduce someone’s humanity so we can get away with hurting them or denying them basic human rights?”
5. If you’re offended by a meme of Trump Photoshopped to look like Hitler, then you shouldn’t have Obama Photoshopped to look like the Joker on your Facebook feed.

There is a line. It’s etched from dignity. And raging, fearful people from the right and left are crossing it at unprecedented rates every single day. We must never tolerate dehumanization—the primary instrument of violence that has been used in every genocide recorded throughout history.”  ― Brené Brown, Braving the Wilderness: The Quest for True Belonging and the Courage to Stand Alone

How to Handle Political Bullying on Facebook – Sherri Gordon

We need to call ourselves to the same standard we expect in others… I sure don’t mean this to sound preachy. Many times, in various situations, I’ve wanted to call out someone’s words as being hurtful or disingenuous or their behavior as deceitful or self-serving. We want to do something!! Words are the cheapest action we can take. Does it change anything to verbally criticize someone on social media? I don’t think so.

Psychologist and author Dr. Henry Cloud, in his excellent book Necessary Endings, counsels us how to deal with three different types of people – the wise, the foolish, and the evil.

  • Wise people – Dr. Cloud points out that wise people can take feedback and use it in a helpful way. In dealing with wise people, talk to them (not about them).  Put the truth out there in non-judgmental ways. Because they can handle feedback and will most probably use it to make changes, the way to deal with people in this category is to keep talking. Bring your concerns to the table and thoughtful and respectful ways. Communicate your own willingness to work for change, by actually working for change. No blaming, nor rationalizing behavior (yours or theirs)…staying in “good faith” relationships can actually invigorate the process of changes.
  • Foolish people – “The fool tries to adjust the truth so he does not have to adjust to it.” Again, talking about the person rather than with her doesn’t change anything, and, in fact, can inflame the situation if done publicly and she hears of it.Dr. Cloud advises, when dealing with the foolish:  stop talking. Nagging will not improve a situation with a foolish person. Rather, set limits and, if possible, create some sort of consequence for the problem you wish you could talk to her about. Limits gave you some space and protection. That consequence alone may drive the person to look at their behavior and change it… At least, it takes the responsibility for change off of you and on to her.
  • Evil people – If the person you want to castigate on social media (or whom you want to believe news reports on her behavior) has shown herself to be evil, then don’t expect change. It can happen, but not by your behavior reflecting hers. As Dr. Cloud talks about putting limits up for yourself with foolish people, you put limits on the evil person when at all possible. He quotes the Warren Zevon song, “Lawyers, Guns and Money“. Maybe somewhat facetiously but also seriously, Cloud is warning to use what resources you have (within the law) to put distance between the evil person and you (and those you love). Antagonizing them in the news/on social media helps no one…and it dehumanizes everyone in its wake. [Guns have become a difficult and divisive subject. Guns is used here in the context of wars against evil or protecting oneself or one’s family against evil.]

Necessary Endings – Summary by Rex Williams for Actionable Books

3) The Power of Words and Names – Just as name-calling (see above) only dehumanizes us, we can use words and names as agents for giving life and honor. They can actually elevate a person, people, or situation. They can move people toward their best selves.

Words mean things.

Author, educator Karen Swallow Prior has written a fascinating book on how her voracious reading of books from childhood onward strongly and positively impacted her. To become the person she is today. The book is entitled Booked – as it should be.

Dr. Prior makes note of the power of words and names in her Booked chapter on E. B. White’s Charlotte’s Web. In the story, a spider, Charlotte, gives her pig friend Wilbur a different understanding of who he is by the descriptors of him that she wove into her web. Powerful.

“Charlotte’s Web is a metaphor for the power words have to shape us into who others see us as well as how we see ourselves.” – KS Prior

“Names are powerful words…All words are names, for all words signify something. The power of naming is a subset of the power of all language. God spoke the universe into existence and, in giving us the gift of language, He gave us a lesser, but still magnificent, creative power in the ability to name: the power to communicate, to make order out of chaos, to tell stories, and to shape our own lives and the lives of others.” –  KS Prior

I love the power of words and parallel power in names. When we lived in North Africa, names and their meanings told us about who belonged to who and what they valued in the giving of names.

How we use words and how we choose names are part of what we give to the world…and to those we love.

4) After School Restraint Collapse – When our children would come in from school grumpy and disrespectful, I would feed them. Then we always had a bit of a break before any homework or other expectation was foisted on them. Little did I know that these are prescribed interventions for something called After School Restraint Collapse.

At the first of the school year, children (and young people) are adapting to new teachers, new routines and rhythms, new expectations. They are trying to cope with all the new and keep their names “on green” or off the teacher’s watch list. By the end of the school day, they are emotionally and physically done, so to speak. Thus, the disagreeable behavior on transferring from school to home. It’s like they need to blow off steam, or get out all the pent-up energy, trying to stay well-behaved all day.

Photo Credit: Need Pix

Besides nourishment and a bit of a break, all the authors recommend that personal touch with their parents. Connecting through the day (notes in a lunch box or a book) helps. Having a no-expectations quiet affirming moment (in whatever way the child prefers receiving it) is also encouraged.

Screens only as a last resort.

After-School Restraint Collapse Is a Real Thing – Here’s How to Deal With It – Colleen Seto

After-School Restraint Collapse is Real – Here’s How to Help Your Child – Heather Marcoux

7 Ways to Help Your Child Handle “After School Restraint Collapse” – Andrea Loewen Nair

5) Using a Timer for Work – When it comes to writing, I could sit at my desk for hours on end. Sometimes, in fact, I do. However, other responsibilities clamber for attention. Using the alarm clock function has become a daily habit for me not to get lost in what is right in front of me. Just recently using a timer as well has become a great discipline. For larger tasks, I may set the timer for 30-45 minutes. For smaller tasks, and just to stay on track, I set 10 minute intervals. Before starting back up, a stretch break or checking on a teammate or a quick food or drink refreshment are all welcome.Photo Credit: MaxPixel

Sometimes, the timer works as a stop point, to move on to a meeting or another work function.  Time fairly flies anyway, so a timer has given me a sense of both urgency and intentionality. It has also helped me be aware of when I’m wasting time or it’s being wasted by someone else (of course, that bears some gentleness in dealing with either situation). Photo Credit: Facebook, Jason Morehead

A timer has helped not just with writing and other work day responsibilities but also with cleaning house. It has added a sense of reward seeing how much can be done in short spurts of time.

Clean House Fast and Efficiently Using a Timer – Ashley

___________________________________________________________________________

Thanks for reading. I hope you were able to pick and choose. A lot of words this week. Blessings on the rest of your weekend!

Bonuses:

The Why Behind the Picture – Dani Fairbairn

Rory Feek – This Life I Live – Documentary

Why Slack Employees Don’t Get Distracted by Slack – Damon Brown

12 Idols We Might Wrongly Follow – Chuck Lawless

Many Beautiful Things – a Documentary on the Life of Lilias Trotter, starring Michelle Dockery

Change the World RVA

Photo Credit: Facebook, Jeanne Barney

Anxiety, Attending or Focus, Books, Character, Communication, Community, Conversations, Critical Thinking, Habits, Leadership, Monday Morning, Monday Morning Moment, Team, work, Work Culture, Workplace or Marketplace

Monday Morning Moment – When You Walk Out of a Meeting, and You Ask Yourself, “What Just Happened?”

Leave a comment

Photo Credit: Media.Defense

Have you had that experience? Where you are meeting with your supervisor…either one-on-one or during a team meeting. She is guiding the conversation and asking compelling questions. Then you give your take on something, and it is as if you’re speaking another language. Then you make the judgment that this isn’t the meeting for you to lay out a strategy or viewpoint, so you stay silent. The meeting ends with your boss commending you/everyone in the room on a good outcome…”we got a lot done”.

Hmmmmm…”What just happened?”

I’ll never forget a strategy meeting earlier in my career. Fairly new to the team, I had been faithful to task in learning the processes and applying myself to fitting into the structure rhythms of our work team. When my supervisor called me in to talk about future directions, he asked my input on our marketing strategies. I actually thought he wanted to know what I thought. As we dialogued back and forth about what we were doing and what we could do to strengthen our messaging, I felt like a genuine and valued part of the team. Then my earnestness and enthusiasm must have gone too far. He commended my “good ideas” (a phrase that has come to mean a negative since then) and asked me to draw up a 5-year plan and we’d talk about those ideas again then.

Although he and I remain friends, we no longer work together. I never did that plan. The kind of work we did was so rapid in it evolution and execution that a 5-year plan was clearly irrelevant. It was clearly just a delay tactic for me to take my “good ideas” and tamp them down.

Not bitter…just wiser. So for that I’m thankful.

A meeting…or series of encounters that leave you wondering “what just happened” could relate to many factors. Culture shift, mission drift, power mongering. Any other factors come to mind for you?

I’d like to pose 3 actions that might help in awkward situations like these. They are by no means comprehensive. Just three helps.

1) Take notes in meetings. Put away your phones and other electronic devices. Pen and pad. Not being distracted by anything else will keep you more fully engaged with the conversation at hand. Note-taking is not for everyone, but you’ll be surprised how helpful it will be to refer back to the meeting conversation. Who said what? Where were the good ideas coming from? What were the responses? You can then keep communication going after the meeting in a healthy manner. You have captured the essence of what happened…important information is not lost…whatever happens next (execution of a plan or further planning meetings) potentially have the clarity you missed in today’s meeting.Photo Credit: PxHere

By the way, maybe someone is already tasked with note-taking. It’s for your sake…maybe only your sake. Worth it if you’ve been having head-scratching experiences of late.

2) Refuse to think ill of others. – Whenever possible, keep your thoughts away from negativity. Especially in judging the motives and character of people you work with. When we operate out of a determination to think well of them, communication can have greater clarity. For sure from our side. It’s when we allow our thoughts to go negative that we conversations can go murky.

Photo Credit: Entrepreneur

Now, there are limits to this, and I get that. In fact, we are wise to isolate out those who have shown themselves untrustworthy. Dr. Henry Cloud wrote the book  Necessary Endings which has an excellent chapter on the three kinds of people in the world – wise, foolish, and evil. Cloud explores, with little sentimentality, how we are to act in the company of each. I’m sure we all hope to find ourselves among the wise.

Necessary Endings: The Employees, Businesses, and Relationships That All of Us Have to Give Up in Order to Move Forward – Henry Cloud

Monday Morning Moment – What You Think of Others Matters – Workplace Wisdom – Deb Mills

3) Recognize that “gaslighting” can be operating in a meeting and no, you’re not going crazy. Recognize it; don’t take it personally; deflect; confront the perpetrator. Move on if possible.

“Gaslighting is a form of manipulation that seeks to sow seeds of doubt in a targeted individual or members of a group, hoping to make targets question their own memory, perception, and sanity. Using persistent denial, misdirection, contradiction, and lying, it attempts to destabilize the target and delegitimize the target’s belief.” – Wikipedia

“Gaslighting is a colloquial term that describes a type of psychological abuse in which the abuser denies the victim’s reality, causing him/her to question him/herself, his/her memory, or his/her perceptions. The term gaslighting is also sometimes used to apply to the use of inflammatory behavior or language that provokes someone to behave in an uncharacteristic way.” – TheGoodTherapy.org Team

Photo Credit: Style Whack

I wrote about gaslighting before here.

Gaslighting for Beginners – Gaslighting Techniques to Use at Work – Sarah Cooper

Gaslighting often happens in relationships when one person uses a sometimes subtle manipulation to cause the other to think maybe she/he misunderstood or over-reacted to something the former did or said. In this unhealthy situation repeated over the course of the relationship, the one being “gaslighted” can begin to distrust her/himself and even go as far as to question their sanity.

I have had this experience and it is highly unsettling.

Ironically, gaslighting can be done by a “good guy” who has developed some habits he uses without mean intent. It can happen to all of us…I’m thinking.

Read psychologist Stephanie Sarkis‘ two pieces below. Very helpful.

– 11 Signs of Gaslighting in a Relationship

Are Gaslighters Aware of What They Do? – Stephanie Sarkis

Photo Credit: Wikipedia

You’re Not Going Crazy: 15 Signs You’re a Victim of Gaslighting – Aletheia Luna

The Culture of Any Organization Is Shaped…By the Worst Behavior the Leader Is Willing to Tolerate – Rich Lochner

Gaslighting in the Workplace Part 1 – What Is Gaslighting and Who Does It? – Heather Bowden

Gaslighting in the Workplace Part 2 – Oh no! I’m a Gaslighter! – Heather Bowden

If you got to the end of all this, here is quite a different piece on “What just happened?” – when your boss may be impressed with you without showing it. Enjoy!

12 Signs Your Boss Is Impressed with You, Even Thought It Doesn’t Seem Like It – Aine Cain