A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about how everyone has a reason for their bad behavior. You can read that here. It talks about how we have to recognize that everyone has a reason for why they may have done something that could have hurt us. Today’s article talks about what to do when we are the person with the consistent reason.
I spend a lot of time asking people questions about why they do what they do. (As an interesting aside, there is a growing body of people in my field who would tell me I should never ask that dreaded why question.)
My naysaying colleagues aside, I will continue to ask the question because the answer matters. Sometimes a husband grew up in a home where anger was normal.
Sometimes a wife learned as a little girl that conflict meant abandonment.
Sometimes a parent is running on four hours of sleep and hasn’t taken a real day off in months.
The reasons are real
.
They deserve compassion.
Understanding.
Empathy.
I’ve also noticed a problem in our culture: somewhere along the way, we’ve started treating explanations like accomplishments.
As though discovering why we behave a certain way somehow changes the behavior itself. Even worse, there’s a growing movement that seems to imply bad behavior doesn’t need to be corrected or changed if the reason for the behavior fits into certain criteria.
That’s not accurate.
It’s not helpful.
And it’s often why people get stuck.
We can seek to understand why we do something. We might even have an obligation to ourselves to attempt that.
But, understanding the cause is never the finish line.
Reasons and Understand Have Value. They Don’t Remove Responsibility.
Understanding why we do something can reduce our feelings of shame around the behavior. Reasons can be helpful in creating understanding.
Understanding does not remove responsibility to change.
Nor does it impact culpability for our behaviors.
One of the healthiest moments in counseling is when someone finally understands themselves. “Oh…that’s why I do that.”
That moment is powerful. It often reduces unnecessary shame. Often, it is the pivot point for growth and healing.
But I worry that we’ve started stopping there.
Knowing your father yelled doesn’t mean you get to yell.
Knowing you were betrayed doesn’t mean you get to betray.
Knowing your anxiety is real doesn’t mean everyone else is responsible for managing it.
Understanding should create compassion for yourself.
It doesn’t give permission for poor or bad behavior.
Pay Attention to Your Most Used Phrases
If you hear yourself repeatedly using phrases that start with…
“I’m just…”
“I can’t help it…”
“That’s just how I am…”
“It’s because…”
“People need to understand…”
You may have found the story you tell yourself to avoid change.
We all have one.
Mine may be different than yours.
But we all have a sentence we reach for whenever accountability gets close. Make no mistake change starts with responsibility.
Ask one brutal question
Instead of asking yourself, “do I have a reason?”, ask, “What have I done to address that reason and rectify my behavior accordingly?”
Let’s be honest, of course you have a reason. Remember, this started because I made the assertion that everyone has a reason for bad behavior.
The reason isn’t in question. Your identity and what you choose to do are. When past experiences become our excuse for our behavior, we remove our culpability. That feels good. The problem is it also often hinders our ability to grow, effectively encasing us in a prison of our own making.
Sometimes, the reason can become part of our identity. This can be especially true if the reason involves trauma. We seem to be obsessed with making our trauma part of our identity in modern society.
The problem with that is if our identity is rooted in our trauma, changing the subsequent poor behaviors feels like a threat to who we are. We become move invested in protecting who we are and what we do, even if it is poor behaviors, then we do in changing and growing.
The people who grow aren’t the people with the fewest wounds.
The people who grow rarely have few wounds. I sometimes think we think the people who grow and change, are the ones with the fewest wounds. That’s often not the case at all.
What is true, is that they’re the people willing to let their wounds explain them without allowing those wounds to define them. The allow their past to inform them but not dictate to them.
There’s a huge difference.
One produces humility, change and growth.
The other produces helplessness.
One of the most freeing moments in life is realizing that your story can explain you.
It does not own you.
You don’t have to deny what happened. You don’t have to pretend it didn’t matter. You also don’t have to hand it the steering wheel.
Everyone has a reason for their behavior.
The question isn’t whether your reason is real—because let’s be honest, we all have reasons.
The better question is whether your reason is helping you become the person you want to be or keeping you from becoming that person.
As a therapist, I’ve noticed that many people confuse being understood with being changed.
They desperately want someone to understand why they do what they do. And when they finally feel understood, they experience relief. But relief is not transformation.
I’ve watched people experience enormous relief when they finally understood themselves. They cried. They felt seen. They felt lighter. Those moments matter. But six months later the marriage wasn’t healthier simply because they understood themselves better. The marriage became healthier when they practiced something different.
Being understood is wonderful.
Being transformed usually requires doing something after you’re understood.
Perhaps, the biggest challenge is the reality that all growth, including our personal growth comes with a price tag.
Often that price tag is our discomfort at letting go of the past and striving toward the uncertain future. It is reaching for growth while knowing that growth will come with pain.
Your past matters.
It shaped you.
It wounded you.
It taught you things you never should have had to learn.
But it does not get the final vote.
The next chapter of your life will not be written only by what happened to you.
It will also be written by what you choose to do next.
And that choice is still yours.
Choose wisely.
Your future self will thank you.
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