Something to Do at Family Gatherings

I'll bet many of you have heard the story about the holiday gathering and the woman who cut off both ends of the ham before cooking it. When her daughter asked her why she cut off the ends of the ham, she replied, "I don't know. Your grandmother taught me to do that. She's in the living room. Go ask her." When asked the same question, the grandmother said, "I don't know. Your great-grandmother taught me to do that. She's in the den. Go ask her." When asked the same question, the great-grandmother said, "Because I had a small cooking pan...the whole ham wouldn't fit in the pan!"

Cutting off the ends of a ham without really thinking about why you are doing it is an example of a behavioral tape. When we perform certain functions, encounter certain situations or recognize certain patterns, we sometimes respond with automatic or pre-programmed behavior that is driven by a behavioral tape. Sometimes these tapes serve us well...and sometimes they do not. For example, most of us have a tape that makes us automatically "look both ways before we cross the street." This tape served us well as a child and continues to serve us well as adults. The "cut off the ends of the ham" tape illustrates how things we learned from our family members can strongly infuence our behavior and easily be passed from generation to generation...even when the tape no longer makes sense! 

Being mysteriously influenced to cut off the ends of a ham is a relatively harmless tape. Such tapes probably won't cause many serious problems in your life. However, some tapes related to how marriages work, how to raise children, how to handle money, how to interact with people and how to respond to the inevitable ups and downs of a normal life probably shouldn't be passed on to the next generation. It might be time to consider re-writing some of the behavioral tapes that are not serving you well and stop them during your lifetime. One way to start this process is by conducting a little informal research on your personal inventory of behavioral tapes. What better time and place to do that than at holiday gatherings?

Don't get me wrong. I am not suggesting that you approach this task by grilling your relatives and trying to probe deep into their inner psyches in an all-out effort to release your inner demons. Lighten up and just engage them in some interesting conversations about "how things were" when you were growing up. Since it is likely that your parents simply passed on many of the tapes they learned from their parents, you will probably get better results by asking indirect questions. For example, rather than asking your parents about their attitude toward money when you were young (which is the point in time that you probably formed many of your attitudes about money)...ask them about their parent's attitude toward money...or ask them what their parents taught them about politics, religion, dealing with authority figures, scarcity, abundance, trusting others, assertiveness, sympathy, compassion, risk-taking, etc. If your parents are no longer living...ask relatives to tell you about your parents. And remember, you may have duplicated your parents tapes...or you may have reversed their tapes and decided, "When I grow up I will never be like them!" For example, if you saw people take advantage of your mom or dad because they were kind and gentle, you may have decided to be more assertive and forceful as an adult. Again, keep it light. You don't want anyone feeling as if they are being psychoanalyzed during holiday gatherings. If you uncover something heavy...go slam down a cup of egg nog and make a mental note to follow up on the issue later.

Here's an example of a behavior tape that I had to re-write to improve my marriage. As a child, I was taught (primarily through actions and not words) that women always cooked the ham, turkey or anything else during the holiday season. My new "holiday cooking tape" (and "everyday cooking tape" for that matter) calls for men to also participate in the preparation of meals. Therefore, if my future great-grandson tells the "cut off the ends of the ham" story...he might have to finish the story by saying, "Your great-grandfather is in the kitchen...go ask him."   

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Chris Crouch, president of DME Training and Consulting, has spent years researching and studying both the mental and physical aspects of being productive.

Comments

[Matthew Cornell]

Great topic - thanks for the ideas. I'd love to see a one-pager on how to discover and replace them.