When I Say No, I Feel Guilty (17 page)

SALLY
: That’s true, Mom, I was out late again last night.

(2) We can agree with
any possible truth
in statements people use to criticize us (AGREEING WITH THE ODDS). In the case of Sally and her mom, if Mom criticized her with a statement of direct wrongdoing, Sally might still respond with assertive FOGGING.

MOTHER
: Sally, if you stay out late so much you might get sick again.

SALLY
: You could be right, Mom. (Or, That’s probably true. Or, I agree with you, Mom, if I didn’t go out so often I would probably get a lot more sleep.)

(3) We can agree with the
general truth
in
logical
statements that people use to manipulate us (AGREEING IN PRINCIPLE). In the case of Sally’s mother, if she persisted in trying to impose her own rules of living
upon her daughter’s lifestyle, Sally could continue to assert herself with verbal FOGGING.

MOTHER
: Sally, you know how important looking good is to a young girl who wants to meet a nice man and get married. If you keep staying out late so often and don’t get enough sleep, you won’t look good. You don’t want that to happen, do you?

SALLY
: You’re right, Mom. What you say makes sense, so when I feel the need, I’ll get in early enough.

In the examples of assertive FOGGING just given, this obviously popular daughter added statements of her intention to be independent of her mother, such as: “… but I wouldn’t stay up so late worrying about me if I were you.” Or “… but I’m not worried about it.” Or “… but I expect I’ll be out late quite a bit now with all these guys wanting to date me.”

As a first practice exercise in learning the assertive skill of FOGGING, I typically have students or patients pair off, with one practicing FOGGING and the other playing the role of a critical “resident bastard.” The FOGGER is instructed to agree with anything he is criticized about by agreeing with truth, agreeing in principle, or agreeing with the odds. The FOGGEE, on the other hand, is instructed to begin his critique with negative comments about the learner’s clothing and attitude, eventually working up to his moral character, probable sexual habits, and any other outrageous fantasy that comes to mind. After their roles are reversed and this practice is finished, I then make the rounds of the pairs individually and try to fade the distinction between classroom role-playing and realistic criticism. I do this so that any reduction in their anxiety response to criticism will not be limited to the practice situation. Without informing them of my intent, I have the learners run through a quick segment of their practice again and seriously interject threatening but unrealistic comments like: “You could do that better, that wasn’t too good; you seem to be a slow learner; your partner seems to be much better at this than you; maybe you
need in-depth analysis of your personality instead of a class like this,” and so forth. At the point where the learner is able to routinely respond with, “You could be right,” his reply is usually accompanied with a muzzled smile or at least a gleam of the eye. At this point, I have difficulty also in not bursting out in a belly laugh. Many times my control is less than that of the students’, and consequently what starts out for them as an anxiety-ridden practice becomes a fun-filled experience. What a paradox! Having fun while someone criticizes you. Learning with this method is typically so rapid that occasionally I vary the format and have four learners work together—one FOGGER, one critic, and two coaches or observers. In the first part of the session, the observers coach the FOGGER. In the latter part of the session, they have to coach the critic to help him think up further outrageous and derogatory comments about the learner. Three critics vs. one assertive person is certainly not fair—for the critics!

Dialogue #4
A beginning practice
exercise using
FOGGING to
cope with
criticism

Setting of the dialogue: Two learners are practicing the use of FOGGING in a classroom. The criticism and FOGGING statements are chosen from the practice exercises of a number of students.

CRITIC
: I see you are dressed in your usual sloppy manner.

LEARNER
:
That’s right
. I am dressed in my usual way. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Those pants! They look like you stole them off the Goodwill rack without pressing them.

LEARNER
:
They are a bit wrinkled, aren’t they
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Wrinkled is the understatement of the week. They are positively dreadful.

LEARNER
:
You’re probably right. They do look a bit worse for wear
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And that shirt! Your taste must be all in your mouth.

LEARNER
:
That’s probably true. My taste in clothes isn’t one of my strong points
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Anyone who dresses like that obviously hasn’t got much going for them.

LEARNER
:
You’re right. I do have a lot of faults
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Faults! Is that what you call them? They are more like chasms. Your personality is one empty Grand Canyon.

LEARNER
:
You could be right. There are a lot of things I could improve
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: I doubt if you are able to do a job effectively if you can’t even dress properly.

LEARNER
:
That’s true. I could improve my work on the job
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And you probably pick up your paycheck each week from the poor boss you are ripping off without feeling any guilt.

LEARNER
:
You’re right. I don’t feel any guilt at all
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: What a thing to say. You should feel guilty!

LEARNER
:
You’re probably right, I could feel a bit guiltier
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You probably don’t budget the salary you cheat other people, hard-working people, not loafers like you, out of.

LEARNER
:
You’re probably right, I could budget my money better, and I do loaf a lot
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: If you were smarter and had some moral sensibility you could ask someone how to buy better clothes so you don’t look like a bum.

LEARNER
:
That’s true, I could ask someone how to buy better clothes
, and
I certainly could be smarter than I am
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You look nervous when I tell you things that you don’t like.

LEARNER
:
I’m sure I do look nervous
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You shouldn’t be nervous, I’m your friend.

LEARNER
:
That’s true, I shouldn’t be as nervous as I am
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: I’m probably the only person who would tell you these things.

LEARNER
:
I’m sure you’re right about that!
[FOGGING with sarcastic emphasis]

CRITIC
: You were being sarcastic.

LEARNER
:
That’s true, I was
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You are not here to learn to be sarcastic, you already know that! You are deliberately resisting how to FOG.

LEARNER
:
You’re right, I already know how to be sarcastic and I probably am fighting learning something new
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Only someone dumb does that.

LEARNER
:
You’re probably right, that may have been dumb of me
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You’ll never learn to do this.

LEARNER
:
You’re probably right, I may never be any good at it
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You’re scratching your ear again.

LEARNER
:
That’s true
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And you quickly pulled your hand away when I pointed it out.

LEARNER
:
I did, didn’t I?
[FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And my pointing it out made you nervous again.

LEARNER
:
I guess you’re right
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You’re hopeless.

LEARNER
:
You may be right
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And what kind of hair style is that you have? It looks like one of those worn by those dirty hippies.

LEARNER
:
It does, doesn’t it
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And it looks just as dirty, too.

LEARNER
:
That’s true. It could be much cleaner, couldn’t it?
[FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You probably would like to live like them; never having to wash and rolling in sex.

LEARNER
:
You could be right
. Maybe I should think about that! [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: And you probably would enjoy all the sexual perversions they perform!

LEARNER
:
That’s a point. You may just be right there!
[FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Now that I think of it, you seem like the type that wouldn’t have to join a band of hippies to be taught sexual perversions. You probably know about them already.

LEARNER
:
That’s true
. I’ve made a lifelong study of sex. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Yes, but I can see from your sneaky, beady eyes that you have already put some of them into practice.

LEARNER
: (By this time grinning from ear to ear)
You may be right
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You shouldn’t grin when you are told what’s good for you.

LEARNER
:
That’s true, I shouldn’t
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: All you do is agree with me.

LEARNER
:
You’re right
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You sound like a yes-man with no spine or personality of his own.

LEARNER
:
I do sound like that, don’t I?
[FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You don’t
sound
like one, you
are
a yes-man!

LEARNER
:
You may be right
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: You’re doing it again.

LEARNER
:
That’s true, I am
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: I don’t think you can say anything but “Yes” to someone!

LEARNER
:
I can certainly see why you think that
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Well, can you say “No” and mean it?

LEARNER
:
Perhaps
. [FOGGING]

CRITIC
: Don’t you know?

LEARNER
: We’ll have to see, won’t we?

As you can see in this training dialogue, the practice of FOGGING does several things. First, it forces the learner to listen to exactly what the critic says. If the critic says, for example, “You sound like.…” the learner replies, “You’re right, I do sound like …” If he says, “I think that you …,” the learner replies, “I can see that you do think that …” or “I can understand why you would think that …” The novice learns to respond only to what the critic actually says, not what is implied or what the novice thinks the criticism implies. It teaches the novice to be a good listener, to listen to what is actually said—not to read minds—by the critic instead of interpreting what is said to conform to the novice’s own self-doubts and insecurities, what we all secretly feel or think. In addition, it forces the learner to think in terms of probabilities—what he would be willing to bet money on, not in absolutes, in yes or no, blacks or whites, 100 per cent or zero. Indeed, the learner may be a bit lazy on the job, but he still gets the job done. His hair probably does have some foreign matter on it, unless he just stepped into the classroom dripping wet from the shower stall. His sexual behavior (or lack of it) would likely be described as perverse by aficionados at both ends of the erotic spectrum. In short, any critical comment will have at least a grain of truth in it, depending upon the relative vantage point from which his behavior and personality are viewed.

At some time during or after the FOGGING drill, at least one sensitive student asks: “How can I agree with someone who tells me something that is not true. I’m not going to lie about myself!” Questions of this type, in my experience, are either prompted by deep feelings of insecurity about that very criticism that is “not true,” i.e., the critique strikes a bit too close to home for comfort, or the learner has such a general lack of confidence in himself that he desperately needs to hang on to those positive things about himself; he is unable to suffer any slander about them. In working with these students, I usually say something like: “What would you do if someone told you that you were suspended three feet off the ground? Standing with your feet
firmly on the ground and with this physical evidence before your eyes, you probably wouldn’t say anything, but just burst out laughing. But how about those things for which you do not have absolute, guaranteed, incontrovertible evidence? For example, if someone says you are dumb, what do you say? You aren’t dumb, are you? (Student always shakes head in negative.) Well, congratulations! You are very lucky, because speaking for myself, I’m very dumb. Sometimes I do very stupid things. Other times I’m brilliant, but a lot of times I’m dumb. Also dumb in comparison to what? In comparison to Einstein and Oppenheimer, I’m a village idiot. On the other hand, in comparison to a lot of people I know, I’m a positive genius. So when I’m told that I’m dumb, I can readily agree with it. You’re probably right; compared to some people, I’m really dumb, and compared to myself, sometimes I’m a real clod. So I listen to what people tell me about myself in all things, and give them the benefit of the doubt. After all, they
may
be right, but then I still make my own judgment about it and do what
I
decide.” One student pursued the matter and engaged me in the following short dialogue: