Monday evening ramble Part II

I'm not going to rehash my recent or less recent bouts of militant boundary enforcement; they're well documented on this blog. But I do want to say that boundaries are not the only concept that drive my impulse to tell people to f* off; credibility is another.

Let me back up to say, I very much believe in checking oneself when someone makes you bristle. When another person's behavior makes you indignant, defensive, or threatened, the first thing to do is get away from that person as needed. Once you're in a safe space (emotionally as well as physically), ask yourself, "what does my reaction say about me?" Understand why what the other person's behavior was as threatening (or merely inappropriate) as it was.

Another angle: when you're tempted to demonize or dismiss someone, ask yourself whether that's fair. (Sometimes it is.) But there's the idea--was it Mark Twain--who said that he'd never met someone so dumb that he couldn't learn from him? (No; it was apparently Galileo, but I was close.)

But let's start with the cases where your gut reaction is entirely reasonable, i.e., where the behavior in and of itself is threatening and inappropriate; in the case of the two boundary-crashers I alluded to above, the very acts of--say, giving me advice--were offensive because of what they represented, i.e., random dudes giving me unsolicited advice because they had positioned themselves as father/brother figure in my life, even though I'd never invited them into my life in that capacity. That's a boundary issue.

Furthermore, their advice was often misguided, insulting, and potentially dangerous (remember when RM argued that I needn't practice changing my bicycle tube, because I could just call him or 911 if I needed to? and I missed the opportunity to say, "do you give that kind of idiotic advice to your daughter?" And remember when BE suggested I stay out of homeless shelters? I did, in that case, react with disgust on the spot). That's a credibility issue.

You can't give someone meaningful advice without credibility, even when you're in an appropriate position. Nothing you say counts for anything when you have no credibility. BE could, would never understand that because everything was so personal to him: I like this person, so I'm going to hire her; I don't like this person, so he's not talented; you're my friend, so you're going to appreciate what I have to say about this issue I don't understand at all.

The credibility issue comes up a lot when people give me (unsolicited) advice about how to deal with my family. I was going to tie this into a recent conversation with a family friend, who suggested that maybe dad was having cognitive issues as well because he wasn't good about cleaning when mom broke a rib, because how could he not understand that dust is unhealthy. Now, I have expressed plenty of frustration--most of it to dad, directly--about his really annoying, stubborn habits (the dust was an issue; not knowing what to refrigerate is another; leaving the fridge door open because it's fine is yet another). And yes, it's one thing that he doesn't have a natural appreciation for these things because he grew up somewhere where you could just leave stuff out and it would be fine, but I've talked to him about all this stuff over and over and he just won't listen. Instead, he'll stubbornly restate his position (without citing any explanation behind it). It's infuriating, but it's not a sign of cognitive decline.

But why was I so frustrated when the friend brought this up? Was it because she had no credibility to bring it up, not knowing my dad that well, even though she had the position, as a close friend? Or was it because the thought of dad not being all there was scary to think about? I had to at least entertain that possibility, and I did. And I concluded that, no, I didn't bristle out of fear--out of the friend having hit a nerve. I bristled because she was completely off-base, and I didn't appreciate getting insights from someone who didn't have the requisite credibility for them to be of any use.