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S2E9 with Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson, author of Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents
619 Plays1 year ago
Ok. This is a BIG ONE.
This week’s guest is Dr Lindsay C. Gibson: A clinical psychologist and bestselling author who specializes in helping people identify and deal with emotionally immature people, or EIP’s.
Her book Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents was a breakthrough best-seller.
And she’s since followed it with a series of popular, related books, including: Recovering from Emotionally Immature Parents, Self-Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, and her latest work, Disentangling from Emotionally Immature People.
Dr Gibson has been featured on some really huge platforms - like the Ten Percent Happier podcast - and her interview also happened to be one of their most popular episodes.
It was such a privilege to chat with her.
Our conversation focused specifically on dealing with EIPs in the workplace.
We covered:
- How Dr Gibson defines Emotionally Immature People (EIPs)
- And how to spot them in the wilds.
- How emotionally immature behavior might manifest at work.
- The workplace dynamics and patterns that Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents can be especially mindful of.
- How to spot an EIP in a job interview. (Hint: They don’t seem to have time for your questions. You already feel like a burden.)
Stay Up To Date via the Content People newsletter:
https://meredithfarley.substack.com/
Where to find Lindsay C. Gibson online:
Website: www.lindsaygibsonpsyd.com/
Books:
- Disentangling from Emotionally Immature People
- Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents.
- Who You Were Meant to Be: A Guide to Rediscovering Your Life's Purpose
- Recovering from Emotionally Immature Parents: Practical Tools to Establish Boundaries and Reclaim Your Emotional Autonomy
- Self-Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: Honor Your Emotions, Nurture Your Self, and Live with Confidence
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to Meredith Farley and Content People
00:00:04
Speaker
Hi and welcome to Content People! I'm your host Meredith Farley. I'm a former chief product officer turned chief operating officer turned CEO and founder. My agency is called Medbury. At Medbury we work with founders, execs, and companies who want to tell their stories and grow. But Content People is not about me or Medbury, it's about the creative leaders and professionals that we interview every week.
00:00:28
Speaker
We'll delve into their journeys, unpack their insights, and ask them for practical advice. If you like it, please rate and subscribe. Let's get started.
00:00:38
Speaker
Hi, everyone. Thank you so much for
Guest Introduction: Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson
00:00:40
Speaker
tuning in. Before we actually jump into the convo with Dr. Gibson, I wanted to give her a quick intro. She's a really, really impressive and exciting guest to have on. Dr. Lindsay C. Gibson is a clinical psychologist and bestselling author who specializes in helping people identify and deal with emotionally immature people or EIPs. Her book, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, was a breakthrough bestseller.
00:01:04
Speaker
and she's since followed it with a series of popular related books including Recovery from Emotionally Immature Parents, Self-Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, and her latest work, Disentangling from Emotionally Immature People. Dr. Gibson has been featured on some really huge platforms like the 10% Happier podcast where her interview also happened to be one of their most popular episodes.
00:01:27
Speaker
It was such a privilege to chat with her. Our conversation focused specifically on dealing with EIPs in the workplace. And Dr. Gibson asked if I could make a quick mention of the fact that the term brain scramble, which we chat on later in the episode and is featured in her books, was coined by therapist Jenny Walters. And finally, since this is our second episode in a row with a therapist, I wanted to just thank my own therapist, Emily. She might be listening.
00:01:52
Speaker
Anything I might know about psychology, I've definitely learned from her and the resources that she's pointed me toward over the years. So, Emily, thank you so,
Understanding Emotional Immaturity
00:02:01
Speaker
so much. Okay, that's it. Let's jump in. Hope you like it. Hi, Dr. Gibson. Thank you so much for joining. I'm very excited to have you on Content People. Oh, I am thrilled to be here. Thank you for having me, Meredith.
00:02:15
Speaker
My goal is to focus our convo on dealing with emotionally immature people, which I know sometimes you shorten to EIPs in the workplace. But more generally, for listeners who haven't read your work, could you define emotional immaturity?
00:02:33
Speaker
Yeah, emotional immaturity is referring to a line of development in people that has to do with certain emotional accomplishments. Like people develop in different areas that you can have your intellectual development, you can have your social development, and those two areas might have developed just fine because they're using a different part of the brain
00:03:02
Speaker
So people can be very intelligent, very successful, very popular. They can be at the top of their social group, they can be at the top of their business, because those are all things that don't necessarily call for emotional maturity. But in the area of emotional maturity, people can be on a continuum of immaturity to maturity.
00:03:30
Speaker
so people can be relatively more or less. But that can be, you can have a very emotionally immature person who nevertheless is able to function just fine in all these other areas, which is what makes it so confusing.
00:03:48
Speaker
Because when I work with people and introduce this idea to them that their parents are sounding to my father owns his own business or my mother is a college professor because they equate accomplishment with all good things. That's our culture. But the all good things doesn't necessarily involve emotional connection and a sense of what's important emotionally.
00:04:15
Speaker
I think one of the things that makes it easier for people to understand it is that we have a special
00:04:25
Speaker
part of our brain, it's associated with the right hemisphere of our brain, that is actually designed to connect us with other people, to see the big picture, to pick up subtleties and nuances, especially in emotional communication. And this is vital for good business relationships, as well as personal relationships.
00:04:50
Speaker
But where you will see the emotional immaturity in those settings is when there is stress or when there is some kind of emotional intimacy that has come up, something that has to do with being close to people. And when those two kind of triggers come up, that's where the emotionally immature person will start showing their colors. They'll react in ways that show how
00:05:19
Speaker
difficult those things are for them. When you say show their colors, what are some behaviors or trends that you might notice in someone and think, oh, there's unexpectedly maybe some immaturity there.
00:05:38
Speaker
Yeah, the first one is that they are extremely egocentric. Now, we're all pretty much socialized, so we all know that it's cool to say or do certain things with other people. But when push comes to shove or they feel threatened,
00:05:57
Speaker
They will act in ways that really tip their hand and show the degree of their own self-centeredness, their own self-preoccupation. They also show very poor empathy. Sometimes when they're relaxed and they feel very safe, they can show empathy because it's no cost to them.
00:06:20
Speaker
but put a tiny bit of stress on them and their empathy goes out the window because they will become very defensive and very concerned about what's happening to their control, their power, their status. They get very reactive and they completely lose sight of how you're feeling. Another one is that they don't self-reflect. For instance,
00:06:47
Speaker
you or I might, if we had a problem in a relationship at work and maybe things didn't go well. And after the meeting, we might think, oh, was I coming on too strong? Or did I misunderstand what they were getting at? Or am I part of the problem here? Am I asking for something that they can't give? We would self-reflect because we would realize that those people are real people too.
00:07:15
Speaker
that they have a point of view. We could imagine standing in their shoes and we could ask ourselves that question, that curiosity about whether or not we had caused part of the problem because we're not as threatened or
00:07:33
Speaker
emotionally fragile as emotionally immature people would be. They can't afford to self-reflect because even the smallest negative thing is likely to make them feel very stressed and very threatened. And then another thing, Meredith, is that when it comes to assessing reality,
00:07:56
Speaker
They have a kind of a wishful coercive attitude toward reality. Like, reality is what they say it is. Reality is something that can be changed to their advantage.
00:08:12
Speaker
So lots of times, if there's something that they don't like that's come up, they can deny, dismiss, or distort what actually happened. And it's all based on how they feel. So if I feel like you're out to get me,
00:08:32
Speaker
I perceive that as a real reality. I don't question myself. I don't question my perception. I just assume that my view of reality, my distorted view of reality is absolutely correct because emotionally immature people always secretly feel like they're absolutely correct, which is a big problem.
Origins and Inspiration for Dr. Gibson's Focus on EI
00:08:56
Speaker
creates a closed system. But that problem with insisting that reality be what they think it is can lead to some pretty remarkable encounters where they say things like, I never said that to you. That's not what I meant. Why are you bringing that up? That's not even on the topic.
00:09:18
Speaker
Yes, it is. And yes, I did. But they're doing what they typically do to protect themselves from a reality that they don't like. I'd imagine there might be some folks listening who already are like, oh, I've worked with or for people where this was such a trend. But before we jump into those bits, I'm really interested, why has emotional immaturity been such an area of interest and focus for you in your career?
00:09:48
Speaker
I started out in my psychological training with a heavy emphasis on child development. In my early training I did a lot of psychological testing and writing up psychological evaluations.
00:10:02
Speaker
And I was taught that you try to give an overall picture of where that person is in terms of their emotional and psychological development. So you don't just say, this person has generalized anxiety disorder. You say, this person has a pretty strong sense of reality. They get along well with other people, but they have this anxiety. They're pretty emotionally mature.
00:10:30
Speaker
Whereas another person, you might say, you can expect this person to react like more of a three or a four-year-old under stress than the 45-year-old man that he is or the 25-year-old man that he is. So you are trying to... I was taught that insight into the level of a person's emotional maturity
00:10:53
Speaker
was tremendously helpful to a therapist who was maybe working with that person in therapy to give them insight into what they can expect to do with that person. And then in my psychotherapy career,
00:11:10
Speaker
I listened to a lot of people describing the behavior of important people in their life. I'm sitting there as the therapist thinking, she sounds like a five-year-old, or her husband's reacting like a 14-year-old. Again, with my developmental background, I started experimenting with telling people what I was seeing developmentally.
00:11:38
Speaker
And it was tremendously helpful to them. They hadn't thought of that significant person in terms of age or their developmental age.
00:11:51
Speaker
And it was like a light went on and it explained so much of the person's behavior because now they had a metaphor that they could use like, this person is going to react like a two year old. Don't tell them no, or they're going to criticize you and act like you're the worst person ever. Or don't expect this person to always tell you the truth because a little kid, they will lie when it's expedient.
00:12:19
Speaker
I mean, it became a way for them to understand these difficult people in their lives. So that fascinated me, that people were having so much trouble in their lives with these emotionally immature people, and they didn't have the concept of thinking about their loved one's emotional maturity.
Emotional Immaturity in the Workplace
00:12:40
Speaker
They just were taking everything to heart. So when I saw how helpful it was to them to get that idea of pegging them in terms of their maturity, then that's when I got the idea for doing the book.
00:12:57
Speaker
When, I'm wondering if it might be useful for listeners to know your kind of assessment of, is it very common to encounter an emotionally mature person? Is it like one in five or is it more like one in a hundred people once in a lifetime you might have to deal with someone like that?
00:13:14
Speaker
Yeah, I wish I had the actual research to share with you on that, but my answer to that question is always read the newspaper. Think about your daily contacts. Think about what proportion of the people that you run into feel safe, make you feel good, make you feel accepted.
00:13:38
Speaker
begin to get a feeling that emotional immaturity is actually pretty widespread. Of course, as a therapist, I would see lots of people who had relationships with emotionally immature people because they make other people so miserable.
00:13:57
Speaker
So they come to the therapist. Meanwhile, the people who are emotionally immature are running wild. They would never go near a therapist unless their marriage is threatened or they were ordered by the court. But they don't see anything wrong with how they are. And it becomes one of these things where the people that really need to change have no idea
00:14:23
Speaker
no idea that it would be a good thing for them to look at themselves. They can't imagine. When you're talking, I wrote down safe, good, and accepted. So I'm guessing people who make you feel safe, good, and accepted are probably safe, emotionally mature folks. Is that a bit of a loose barometer folks could use? Yeah, that's a good loose barometer, I think, because an emotionally immature person
00:14:52
Speaker
might make you feel special. They might make you feel pumped up. They might make you feel like you're pretty exceptional. It has to do with a power-based thing where the best way they can make you feel is that there's something special and pleasing to them about you.
00:15:18
Speaker
And that's very different from that person-to-person kind of feeling of emotional safety or the feeling that you're being accepted as a person.
00:15:32
Speaker
Lots of times when emotionally immature people are positive toward other people, it has a kind of a evaluative tone to it. Like even if I said to you, you're really great. You're fantastic. You're wonderful. You're brilliant. Okay. It also means that they are evaluating you.
00:15:55
Speaker
And you're coming out being judged as all these good things, but you're still being judged and you're still being sized up for what you can do for them. Whereas when you meet a person who is more receptive and more emotionally mature,
00:16:18
Speaker
you'll feel like you could talk to them about stuff like if you had a problem or you feel like they are liking you and relating to you person to person. It's a very different feeling. But I will say that evaluative, pumping you up kind of thing is very effective.
00:16:41
Speaker
for sweeping you off your feet. And it isn't until later that you realize that they might do the opposite if they're displeased. They might criticize you harshly for not living up to their expectations. That's so interesting. And I think I can naturally understand the distinction you're making between someone who is charismatically
00:17:10
Speaker
expressing that they have found you to be up to their standards versus just someone who's making you feel good. I'm really excited to get into the work question because as you're talking, I'm also thinking, but in the workplace, a boss, for example, often is evaluating you.
00:17:29
Speaker
And so there's complexity there. So I guess what my first workplace question would be, how might emotional maturity manifest in the workplace? And how do you think we could spot those folks?
00:17:43
Speaker
Yeah, that feeling of being initially swept off your feet I think is a good one because a lot of people in the workplace who are in positions of power tend or may tend toward the narcissistic end of things because narcissists can be very successful in our society.
00:18:08
Speaker
because of their power motivation and their need for control and their willingness to take action. These are things that are often rewarded within the system. But that feeling that you're being swept off your feet and also that you're being rushed
00:18:27
Speaker
You have to make up your mind quickly. Like you have to give them a yes or a no. You have to come up with an answer. There's a pressured quality behind the way that they react. And you can think, oh, it's because this job is so important. This task is so crucial. That's why they're rushing. They're rushing you because they don't like stress. They don't have a strong capability of remaining
00:18:56
Speaker
functional when they're under stress. So they throw off stress themselves, throw it out to other people and make them stress, make them hold those unpleasant feelings. And they just don't want to wait because that's unpleasant for them.
00:19:17
Speaker
And you may also, you mentioned the word charismatic, and that's such a good word. It can be charismatic in a positive sense in that you're very drawn to them. You, yeah, you feel pumped up and positive about yourself around. They can also be charismatic in a negative way or in a, we might say, a kind of a
00:19:37
Speaker
dark way in that you're afraid of them. Their charisma is that this person is someone who knows it all, they have all the power, and while they're being nice to you right now, you definitely get the feeling that they could use their power
00:20:00
Speaker
against you for you. You don't know exactly how it's going to turn out, but you do have that feeling of their power. And so you can feel a little in awe of them and they can make you feel nervous, just a little nervous instead of really comfortable. Like you can tell this in a job interview when you may have a list of questions that you wanted to ask.
00:20:26
Speaker
with an emotionally immature employer, you may feel like you're using up their time and that they don't want to be bothered with the small stuff. So you begin to feel like, oh, am I being
00:20:42
Speaker
needy by asking these questions, these specific questions to nail down exactly what they're offering me. And so maybe you don't ask that question because it seems like you better speed things up or it seems they're listening
00:20:58
Speaker
doesn't last very long before they want to move on to the next thing. These are all kind of qualities that you would notice probably very early, but not necessarily be aware that this was a red flag for how it's going to feel to work with this person.
00:21:20
Speaker
Those are all so helpful. I identify with what you're saying. So feeling a bit of nervousness, even when they're being positive toward you and unconscious understanding that there's another side to this person that could be quite terrifying. And feeling like even in an interaction where
00:21:42
Speaker
One would be totally expected to bring questions to a job interview, but really getting the sense that it's beneath them and that you're wasting their time. If you just feel that in a job interview, it could be a good indicator.
00:21:55
Speaker
This might not be the nicest boss to sign on with, perhaps. And it's similar to what the children of emotionally immature people feel. Like you end up having to curb your needs. You end up feeling like you're asking for too much. You're wasting their time.
00:22:16
Speaker
you're annoying them. Now maybe they're not acting annoyed yet, but you can tell from their body language that they want to get on with it and reach a decision or ask you the next question. And so it feels like you can't really say, excuse me, so we go back to this other thing because I wanted to ask you about what exactly did you mean when you said whatever?
00:22:41
Speaker
They'll ask like, why are you wasting their time? What do I have to have it in writing for you? We already covered that? Or whatever it is, but it's because it's not because your question is silly. Your question is vital. You're talking about maybe taking this job. But they make anybody feel not intelligent, not grown up.
00:23:07
Speaker
If they're asking questions to nail things down, that emotionally immature boss really doesn't want to talk about, really doesn't want to go into the minutiae. They just want you to get swept up with them and say yes, and now we'll go on and I'll be your boss. What could be simpler than that?
00:23:30
Speaker
Thank you. As you're talking, and I've got your new book here, Disentangling from Emotionally Immature People. It was reminding me, and I just flipped to, it was section 20 where you, under the strategy section, and one thing I really love about this book is the way it gives strategy for dealing with these
00:23:49
Speaker
characteristics or dynamics that one could experience. One of the points under strategy, when someone was making you feel panic or urgency over their problem, that one really made me think about the workplace a bit. And I loved that you said, don't get back with them until you're sure your response feels doable and agreeable to you. And that really reminded me of a lot of instances at work where certain folks, the ask always had
00:24:16
Speaker
a panic, a such an intensity to it. And I would find myself sometimes in the moment just being like, you know what? I can do it. I can help. Like jumping in and then later I'd be like, wait a second. Like, why should I do that? I feel like I just got strategically bamboozled a little bit. And I thought that your advice here was so good, but it's also hard when you're, it's hard in the moment. I think sometimes it takes practice to
00:24:42
Speaker
feel comfortable being like, let's take a beat. I'll give it some thought. You give it some thought and we'll regroup. And not always something one's always in a position to do. I realize too, if for example, I'm thinking about coworkers here, but if one's boss comes to them and it's like, we have a problem, how are you going to fix it? It's harder to say, let's take a beat, though sometimes doable.
00:25:02
Speaker
But I love the way that you present that because that would be a really good strategy to use if it wasn't with your boss who is rushing you and annoyed with you and all of that. It may not work well with them because they would see it as, why are you causing me more stress? Why don't you just do what I tell you to do? But it can work with people that you're on an equal footing with who are trying to
00:25:30
Speaker
Russian bamboozle you that's a really good strategy for them and another question I had is somewhat related if someone has an emotionally immature boss or a Co-worker, do you think it's possible to comfortably or maybe not comfortably but in a healthy way to make it work long term or Would do you say if you can you might want to get yourself out of this situation?
00:25:58
Speaker
Yeah, it depends on what your tolerance is and it depends on what your situation is because lots of times once we're in a job, it's not like it's easy to find another one that takes time. So lots of times you're going to end up dealing with this person for a while, even if you have resolved to get another job.
00:26:24
Speaker
So only you can know what the effect is on you. For instance, I had a young woman who came in to see me in therapy, and she had a panic attack and scared her to death because she'd never had one before. And to hear her side of the story, she said, there's absolutely nothing going on. There's no problem. I was just driving. All of a sudden, I had to pull over, and I felt like I was dying.
00:26:52
Speaker
Anyway, after we analyzed this for a while, we come to realize that her boss was very needy and very pressured and very critical. And he was calling her like at 12 o'clock at night with an emergency for the next day and wanted her to come into the office the next day with an answer to it.
00:27:21
Speaker
And it was more than she could actually take physically. So after sleepless nights, lots of boundary intrusions by this boss, she began to realize, oh, this is having an effect on me. It's having an effect on my health. It's having an effect on my
00:27:39
Speaker
self-esteem on my emotional being. And then she decided that she was ready to move on to find something else. But at first, probably because of her own background, she was like one of those, that old story about put a frog in water and bring it to boiling and the frog never realizes because it's so gradual that this is a dangerous situation.
00:28:05
Speaker
And so she was like that frog absorbing more and more of his demands, thinking she was handling it until, like that famous book title, her body finally said no. And that was the moment she had enough. But she wasn't conscious of what she had enough of. She just thought that she was having a heart attack.
00:28:30
Speaker
So sometimes it's a challenge to become conscious of the effects of these people on this. Yes, I appreciate that story. And I'm going to jump ahead for a second. So I loved your interview with Dan Harris on 10% Happy. I listened to both of them multiple times. And the first one, you talked about how folks who have emotionally immature histories, maybe a parent or a caretaker,
00:29:00
Speaker
that they might sometimes be drawn to emotionally mature partners because there are subliminal similarities that feel very familiar and compelling. And we obviously do not get to choose our bosses or colleagues in the same way we choose partners. But I was wondering if you think there are patterns that adult children of emotionally immature parents should be particularly mindful of avoiding work. Yes.
00:29:30
Speaker
Yes, and also patterns in themselves at work. Yeah, just like with an important relationship, like choosing a partner or even a best friend in those important personal relationships,
00:29:49
Speaker
We tend to bond with people that are familiar to us and have been around us as we were growing up.
00:30:02
Speaker
They feel familiar to us. They feel safe. We find it very easy to bond with them because we know the drill. We know the dance. We figured that out at a subliminal level a long time ago. And so when we meet one of these emotionally immature people in adulthood, it feels like family. There's a reason why we use that word familiar.
00:30:26
Speaker
based on family because we know how to be with it. With an employer or people that you work with, it's the same thing. You can use the same coping mechanisms that you used with the emotionally immature people in your own family. And depending on the efficacy of those
00:30:55
Speaker
coping mechanisms that you use, you can either preserve yourself and your own emotional well-being, or you might jump in and re-enact this same kind of relationship that you had with that difficult person in your past. For instance, you might subliminally agree, yes, my needs aren't important,
00:31:24
Speaker
but your needs are all important. I will just keep my problems to myself and I'll make you the most important person in the relationship. This is what I'm agreeing to. And also that I will help you feel emotionally stabilized. I'll help you calm down. I'll reassure you. I'll be whatever you need me to be. And I'll also make you feel good about yourself.
00:31:54
Speaker
I know how to calm people down and make them feel a good self-esteem because that's what I grew up with. This is what a person might be thinking. And then they, like a child that they were in an emotionally immature relationship with a parent,
00:32:14
Speaker
They might feel like I can do it all. I'll take care of this. I'll come out on top because I'm the one who'll be doing everything. And so I can ensure that everything turns out all right. And of course, they take on responsibility without realizing what it's doing to them. Like my example of that woman that I worked with.
00:32:38
Speaker
So, yeah, it's not hard to end up in work situations where you're doing a lot of the same things that you had to do in your childhood. When you're talking about the kind of the coping behaviors or understandings of the dynamics people might bring to it, it sounds to me like those are unconscious and perhaps by learning about this and doing your best to make
00:33:08
Speaker
the unconscious conscious, you can be more objective and mindful about how you're going to engage with certain people. Is that right? Yes, absolutely. That's one of the enormous benefits of therapy or coaching is that
00:33:28
Speaker
It helps you look at other people more objectively and then see some of these patterns and see how they operate. I think that's one of the reasons why my book turned out to be so popular is that people were like, oh yeah, I've been seeing that for years.
Strategies for Dealing with Emotional Immaturity
00:33:44
Speaker
We have an explanation and now we have some ideas about what to do with that.
00:33:51
Speaker
But there's also another quality to that, which is, yes, I can see what this other person is doing, but it's also very important to be able to see what you're doing and how you're responding with typical kinds of behaviors that don't take care of yourself, that
00:34:19
Speaker
detach you from your connection to yourself that make you forget to even ask yourself, do I think this is right? Do I want to do this? Is this fair? Is this a boundary incursion? Do I need to set a limit? Lots of times people who grew up with emotionally mature parents have not been taught that kind of self-care
00:34:45
Speaker
and they have not been taught how to maintain a connection emotionally with themselves so that they don't lose their own integrity trying to fit in with what the emotionally immature person wants. I feel like now would be the perfect time also to mention, I'll have mentioned it at the beginning, but you do have a book, self-care for adult children of emotionally immature parents, and I'd imagine that some of those
00:35:14
Speaker
some of the things in that book could also just be useful for people who've been in a complicated work dynamic someone as well. Yeah, absolutely. That book has a slightly different format from the other books because each one of the chapters is a little explanation of a certain piece of this.
00:35:37
Speaker
To me, they're fun to read because it's not explanatory. It's more like reading a fun piece that is short, succinct, and has some kind of wisdom in it. So it's something that you can read before you go to sleep at night or if you just want to relax for a minute. It doesn't demand the kind of focused learning attention that you might have with another formatted book.
00:36:07
Speaker
all of your books, you've talked about the concept of brain scramble, which when I read it, I thought, oh, yes, I have certainly, I'm familiar with that. And I was wondering if you could define it and talk a little bit about how we can know when we are experiencing it. Yeah. So brain scramble is a term that a colleague of mine came up with, which I was so
00:36:38
Speaker
struck by because it really explained an experience that I've certainly had and a bunch of other people have had where they're trying to talk with an emotionally immature person about something, it's usually something important. They're usually trying to get some information from the EIP or they're trying to
00:37:02
Speaker
maybe get some stuff in order like you could be buying a house from them and you're trying to ask them about these five things. But there's something where you need them to give you something that the emotionally immature person perceives as
00:37:21
Speaker
maybe forcing them or taking something away from them or something where they feel a little uncomfortable about it and instead of them in an above board way saying that's not something that I care to answer right now or I don't understand exactly what you're getting at or I don't know,
00:37:47
Speaker
It could be as simple as that. They'll start talking about all kinds of stuff. It may be tangentially related, but they certainly aren't answering your question. When they give you this barrage of answers that really aren't on the topic, or they take it off in a different direction, or they just flat out don't answer your question,
00:38:15
Speaker
It feels very confusing, and unfortunately, all of us try to make sense out of it.
00:38:24
Speaker
So we get the brain scrambling off the topic, tangential answer. And if you are a sincere sort of person, you'll be thinking, okay, so I asked this, they said that, what are they trying to tell me here? And you're trying to make sense out of something that may actually be nonsense. It may actually be nothing to do with what you asked about.
00:38:52
Speaker
And if you don't realize that's what people like this do, you'll wear yourself out trying to make sense of it. And then at a certain point, you'll just shut down. That's the brain scramble. I can't even think of what I want to ask next. I'm dead in the water. I have no idea what we're talking about now.
00:39:14
Speaker
I don't even remember what I wanted to ask them. So it's very effective to get you to back down and back off instead of continuing to try to pin them down to get your answer.
00:39:29
Speaker
I think that it's so helpful to think of it as something that is legitimately happening to us versus just us being confused or stupid. I was thinking about in the context of war, I think it can feel even a little more complex sometimes because someone could think
00:39:50
Speaker
say they're experiencing that brain scramble after a meeting with their boss and the meeting ends and they're like totally bewildered almost and are, wait, what did we just say? What were the action steps? What are the expectations? And I think so many people made it that moment actually think, oh, I could not keep up. Like I am the problem. And then it feeds into maybe an imposter syndrome or just like a low self-esteem around work. And I was wondering if you have any tips for sorting through
00:40:20
Speaker
brain scramble versus just genuine confusion or miscommunication. Are there any like telltale signs where you can say, this is X and this is Y? Yeah, I think that probably the best test of what you're experiencing would be to think about how do they make you feel when you ask for clarification.
00:40:45
Speaker
Okay, you're gonna feel at some point like you missed something or that what they said didn't make sense or seem to be off topic and you will have a healthy communication reaction of wanting to ask them what about that or ask them for clarification and if you ask
00:41:09
Speaker
an adequately emotionally mature person for clarification because they have empathy and because they can put themselves in your shoes, they will be glad to restate what they said and clarify what they said because they want to communicate with you too and they know what it's like to not be sure about something or have something be unclear and they will be
00:41:34
Speaker
normally willing to help you out with that, okay? But the emotionally immature person will make you feel like you stepped over a line, like maybe almost as if you had challenged them by asking for clarification, which incidentally is how the emotionally immature person probably feels because they are so
00:41:56
Speaker
painfully sensitive to any hint that someone might be criticizing them or questioning them. They just can't stand that. So yes, if they come back with irritation or implying that you're the one that had trouble keeping it, what I said was fine, and they give you some answer that blows you off, that's a good indicator that you're probably dealing with an emotionally immature person.
00:42:26
Speaker
you'll feel nervous and not comfortable with them. You'll start to inhibit yourself and censor yourself where you will think twice about clarifying something. Because again, it feels like you're making the train slow down, like you're being instructionistic, that you're taking up too much of their time, like you should have already gotten this.
00:42:51
Speaker
And that is so unfair because if there's someone who's involved in a project and they don't understand what's going on or what the person just said, what a time saver it is to get that straight right in the moment. But the emotionally immature person, because they can't stand to wait, will rush ahead and make you feel like you're needlessly impeding progress.
00:43:20
Speaker
And that's where the brain scramble just gets very disorganizing because how are you supposed to go ahead when you don't understand what they just said? It's fun. As you're talking about it, I think it makes so much sense. But I also have to say there's a part of me thinking about, since I worked in agency environments for a really long time, which are fast paced, high stress sometimes.
00:43:49
Speaker
And there are probably moments, I think when I was a younger manager, especially where I felt frustration at people, I was like, guys, we went over this. We don't have time. We have to like, and I felt frustration there. I don't know. Maybe there's low immaturity in me and those moments there. And I also, but I guess what am I trying to ask? I suppose as a manager, maybe it's also very important to stay connected and conscious of the, the environment you're creating and not falling prey to creating these
00:44:19
Speaker
high stress situations where people need to be perfect to feel comfortable and accepted. Right. Yeah, of course. I understand about a situation like that where it's very necessary that you have to move quickly and there are deadlines happening and a lot of information being downloaded on people in a very short amount of time.
00:44:45
Speaker
Yeah. And so, of course, as the manager, you're tasked with getting stuff done in a timely manner. And yes, you might get frustrated and say, guys, we already went over this. What is it that you're not getting here? But
00:45:01
Speaker
probably after that meeting, you might self-reflect and think, gee, I wonder if we need to spend more time in prep before these meetings or maybe I need to talk to this person because this is the third time that they haven't really kept up. What does that mean? Do I need to check out with them whether this is the right position for them or is there something that we could help them try that would
00:45:31
Speaker
increase their being with it in the meeting, you would probably try to figure out how to make it better and you would also have in the back of your mind, is this person really well suited to this kind of environment where we have to move fast with a lot of information?
00:45:48
Speaker
But what I'm saying is that for the emotionally immature manager there is a quality of Not of problem solving not like what we need to do about this But it's there's something the matter with you like you're inferior because you're slowing us down there's a judgment about it that
00:46:11
Speaker
can really be hard to take. Whereas you can have another kind of manager who is, we need to move fast on this. The clock is ticking. We don't have time. What do you need to get this? That's different. That's you dealing with them as an equal.
00:46:29
Speaker
and letting them know the importance of what it is that you need from them, that's different from somebody who communicates that feeling of, why are you being so difficult or are you stupid? That's a different feel in those two situations. One is reality-based and the other now has become, I'm going to judge you and maybe even
00:46:56
Speaker
humiliate you a little or a lot because I'm not getting what I want. And you should know that you should have guessed what I want. And you should have supplied it without me having
Feedback and Emotional Maturity
00:47:08
Speaker
to ask. That's the emotional and maturity piece of it. Yeah, I really appreciate that. And one thing that is hard for managers sometimes, I think gets easier the more you do it, is that you're in an archetypal role.
00:47:23
Speaker
And you are evaluating, you are assessing, and one has to do that in a management role, but also you can feel guilty of doing that. But there was a line in your book that I loved. It's a great moral compass for being a manager or reporting into someone. And it was something to the effect here it is. It says, it is reasonable to expect that if you're frequently interacting with someone, you two will respond to each other with tact and empathy.
00:47:49
Speaker
And I love that because it's like as a boss, of course, tact and empathy. Also, if someone, if you're reporting into a boss, maybe you don't like tact and empathy because there's also plenty of bosses out there who have difficult folks that they deal with who report into them. Is there anything I didn't ask that specifically around work you want to make sure to speak to or say?
00:48:09
Speaker
Yeah, let me see, there was a, oh, yeah, I just wanted to mention in the workplace, this was a question actually of yours Meredith, when you feel like you're not getting anywhere near enough positive feedback from your manager or from the person who is in the position to give that kind of feedback.
00:48:35
Speaker
I really feel so strongly about this because people will feel bad about needing to have reassurance, encouragement, praise, recognition, and with an emotionally immature boss or manager, whoever it is that has a position of authority over you.
00:49:00
Speaker
they will often make that person feel like they're being a baby for needing positive feedback. And it's really important for people, especially if they've been the child of an emotionally immature person, that they recognize that what they're asking for is not something crazy and extreme. They're asking for a moment of
00:49:29
Speaker
connection and encouragement to give them energy because this is how human beings give each other energy. They have some kind of nice interaction with each other and each person who walks away from that interaction with more energy and a little uplift. It's not a crazy thing to ask for or to want and I think it's very important that people think this out for themselves. Like why do I think that positive feedback is important?
00:49:58
Speaker
And then that you explain that to the person that you're asking for it from, that you explain to them that, no, I'm not emotionally needy. I've got plenty of that in my life. But when I'm trying to do a really good job, I like to know when I'm on track.
00:50:21
Speaker
and whether or not I'm doing what you feel is the kind of work that will support my promotion or support my growth in this field or whatever, I need to know that I'm on the right track and that we're in sync with each other about our work together. You have to be able to speak up for that and explain it, but in order to do that, you really do have to think that it's okay.
00:50:50
Speaker
Yeah. But the emotionally immature manager or boss tends to act like you're a machine, like there's something immature about you for needing positive interaction. And they act very emotionally stingy. They don't have a sense of empathy for the basic human need to be well regarded by our peers or by our bosses.
00:51:19
Speaker
And they can act like nothing is ever enough. Like, why should I praise you? Because you didn't do 100% of the job yet and you didn't knock my socks off. They have very high standards. Not just that you did a good job, but did you impress me? Did you stun me? Did you make me think that you're the most incredible employee I've ever had? It's that kind of high bar
00:51:45
Speaker
that shows the stinginess of the emotionally immature boss. But the real problem is that when you give praise to someone and you see their eyes light up and there's a warm moment,
00:52:00
Speaker
The emotionally immature person is terrified of emotional closeness and emotional intimacy. They do not take that at all. And so they will stiffen up and want to get back to business and they will resist anything that creates that warm moment between people.
00:52:25
Speaker
And of course, that's what praise does is it creates a movement between people. So you just have to be aware that this is part of their problem. It's not your problem. And we would all do a lot better in our jobs if we had more of it.
00:52:43
Speaker
I'm so happy that you brought that up. So that is good. Teen of the new book. I have it. Like this bit, you probably can't see, but so underlined. And I would say as a manager, specific and genuine praise, I think is like a cheat code. You, you tell folks what they're doing. Well, they do more of it and they feel better about the work they're doing. And this section reminded me actually of a woman, Felicia, who sometimes listens and
00:53:08
Speaker
She wouldn't mind me saying this. When I managed her, she was very upfront and she was like, I like the positive feedback that you give me and that really motivates me. I was so happy she said that and I thought it was so mature and clear-eyed about herself.
00:53:22
Speaker
And I do really, I love this section as a manager, giving praise also feels really good. There's so many problems throughout the day. Sometimes that I used to do this little thing where if I was having a rough day, the last two things I do that day would be praising someone for a good job or a thank you for something they did because it also just took some stress off of me and reminded me stuff's going well. And it was nice to do that. And I found, you know, it's impactful to how
00:53:52
Speaker
the teams feel, but as you're talking about charisma, I wonder what am I trying to ask here? Is there something manipulative about knowing that people respond well to praise and therefore, what is the difference between praise and, as Gen Z would say, rizzing someone up in your mind? I know there is a difference one can feel inside, but is it two sides of the same coin or totally separate to your mind?
00:54:22
Speaker
Yeah, no, they're separate because one where you're giving praise or recognition to someone because you're really glad they did that or you hadn't thought of that yourself and they did or they took initiative to do something that you hadn't told them to do yet. Whatever it is, there is a genuine appreciation on your part and you feel lubed
00:54:48
Speaker
to show gratitude to them or to show recognition to them. That is person to person, okay? But for the more emotionally immature person,
00:54:59
Speaker
Yeah, they are, it's a strategic move that increases their power and influence over you. And that's where people get that feeling like I'm being built up here and it feels like there is a hidden agenda or it feels like I'm being set up to
00:55:23
Speaker
I don't know, work harder, owe them whatever the hidden agenda might be. But it doesn't feel good because you sense that you're being treated like an object.
00:55:35
Speaker
Yeah. They're actually getting something for themselves from this maneuver with you where they're building you up or being overly effusive with their praise. You can sense when you're being treated like an object and you can sense when you're being treated like a real person. So if you receive it and it feels genuine to you.
00:55:58
Speaker
Cool. If you receive it and you just get that uncomfortable feeling, you might be in the presence of charisma and you can be a little more wary of that. Is that right? Yeah. What's important is to remember that person is praising you to get something out of you. And the other one is that this person is praising you to give you something. And that's a real distinction to be aware of.
00:56:25
Speaker
Do you think there's anything complicated as a manager, genuinely wanting to praise people, to praise them, but also knowing it makes the team happier, it makes the team work better? Do you know what I mean? Yes, because we always, if you think about it, like in terms of what parts of the brain these different behaviors are coming from, yes, we can be doing a genuine praise where we're giving something to someone because we're grateful to them what they've done.
00:56:53
Speaker
But that doesn't mean that this other side of your brain isn't sitting up there thinking, yeah, and then they're going to work harder and have a better team.
00:57:01
Speaker
bottom line and all of that. So it's not like we're going to get rid of one side or the other. We can have both channels running, but it feels different if only the channel is running of, I'm going to do this and they're going to work harder for me or I'm going to get more of what I need out of them. That other channel of true gratitude or appreciation is
00:57:29
Speaker
That's been inhibited. So, yes, of course, we're all calculating people because we all have that part of our brain that looks at things in terms of their advantage to us, which is not a bad thing. It's just you don't want to completely live there like the emotional people do.
00:57:50
Speaker
Okay. I appreciate that. I like the idea of if both parts are online, you're not actively a psycho. It's okay. You don't want to be the innocent babe in the woods either because the fact is that at a certain level, these things do work.
00:58:07
Speaker
They do increase productivity. They do increase a person's willingness to stay longer at the office at night. We want to be aware of that. We just don't want it to be the only motivation that we have in our responses to people. At least that's the way I see it. Yeah. No, I think that makes total sense.
00:58:29
Speaker
Thank you so much, Dr. Gibson. I was so excited to have you and it was really such a privilege to talk to you and pick your brain about these things and hear your thoughts on
Conclusion and Listener Engagement
00:58:39
Speaker
them. I'm really grateful. Oh, thank you. You asked such interesting questions. I really had fun talking with you about it and I appreciate you inviting me on.
00:58:52
Speaker
All right, folks, I hope that you enjoyed that episode. Thank you so much for listening. If you liked it, please subscribe or review us. And if you want to check out our newsletter, Content People, it is in the show notes. See you next time. Bye.