Richard Maun

Category: Uncategorized

  • The Parent Ego State

    This finger belongs to Queen Victoria. Who is pointing the finger at you in your head?
    This finger belongs to Queen Victoria. Who is pointing the finger at you in your head?

    Here’s a dilemma: Should I go to the beach or stay in and do some work? Naturally my Child wants to go and play and yet there’s a voice in my head that whispers caution…it would make sense to take advantage of a quiet house. I could get some work done and then have some time off to play. I ought to use the opportunity and tick off a couple of items on my to-do list…

    When you re-read that dilemma it looks like you can ‘hear’ two people struggling to get their point across. In my Child Ego State I want to go and build sand castles and the other voice is my Parent Ego State, which is telling me what really is the best thing to do.

    Who Is In Your Head?

    The term ‘Parent Ego State’ refers to the collection of other people who have influenced us and who we carry around in our head. We carry their words and phrases and ways of thinking around with us and when we replay them, we’re said to be in our Parent Ego State. So, when I’m saying to myself that ‘I should be doing some work’ what I’m doing (in TA terms) is replaying a tape of Mum, or Dad encouraging me to work. Our heads are full of the voices from the past and we take them on board by a process called Introjection, which means we just absorbed them in directly without considering their meaning or purpose. We tend to do this at a young age and most of the tapes relate to the key influences we had at that time. Perhaps our family, our first teacher, a neighbour, or aunt or big brother all left their mark on us. Because we were young we didn’t question what we heard we just sucked it up and added it to our store of memories.

    Leadership And Taking Care

    Now that we’re ‘grown ups’ we use these people to guide us and sometimes they’re helpful. We follow their rules and use their advice to make decisions. We copy what they did (or said to do) to take care of ourselves and others. Sometimes we need a bit of leadership and sometimes we need to look after people, so these influences can be helpful to have.

    However…

    We might also carry around rubbish. We might have too many rules and these limit our freedom to act, or set restrictions on how we can have fun. We might have learned to take care of people by ‘smothering’ them with love or affection, or by telling them what to do before they’ve had a chance to ask for help. This isn’t a great way of taking care and is often the root cause of well meaning, but patronising behaviour.

    The chances are that we all have a few rocks in our head and part of life is about recognising them, smiling when we trip over one and then doing what makes sense to us now. Often when we use the words should, ought, must we are in our Parent Ego State and are trotting out someone else’s wisdom, or rules.

    So What?

    Knowing about Ego States is useful because we can think about our behaviour and can decide to make changes. We can find new people to guide us, or can challenge what’s in our head and can stop doing the work and can build sand castles instead. That’s what I did on Sunday. And I had an icecream and I swam in the sea. It was great.

    Eric Was Here First

    I was asked by someone if I ‘credited Berne’s work’ in my Ego State-related posts sometimes, as Eric Berne was the founder of TA and someone who came up with many of the models. This was a real Parental instruction, the smugness of which instantly made my Child feel rebellious (my Child hates being out-smugged). So, in the spirit of rebellion I thought it would make a great blog post for next week: How the Parent and Child Ego States interact. Can you guess how they get on and how they get stroppy?

    Eric Wasn’t Here First

    Sadly for my credit-hound Berne didn’t invent Ego States, which is why I haven’t credited him as such. He based his work, and freely acknowledged it, on the ego psychology described mainly by Paul Federn and developed by Edoardo Weiss. What he did do was suggest that the archaic parent/child influences were also employed alongside a more grounded and rational position, which he called the Adult. We’ll meet the Adult Ego State in the future. He also drew some models and said lots of clever and thoughtful things and we love him for that too.

    Our Task For This Week

    Is to…spot one thing that we do, or don’t do, that is based on one of our Parental tapes. When we find the thing, we need to ask if it’s helpful, or if it is getting in the way and needs to be ejected. Listen out for the shoulds and oughts as they are often a big clue. Should we do that thing? Really???

    Amazon Review

    Job Hunting 3.0 has had it’s first review (thank you) and I’ve been told an excerpt is likley to be in the Sunday Times too, so that’s two good things to celebrate. If you have read the book please do add your review to Amazon as they make a difference. Just click here – thank you!

    Pass It On

    If you know someone who would be interested in this blog post please forward it to them, or ReTweet it, or let them know they can subscribe to regular emails via the box on the homepage.

    Thank you for reading to the end and remember to begin spotting when you’re in your Parent. If you want to, that is.

    Next week is about when the Parent and Child battle it out…and get on sometimes.

  • The Child Ego State

    Enjoy some swing time and get to know your Child
    Enjoy some swing time and get to know your Child

    How do you sulk? Think for a moment and for fun have a go at answering that question. Do you pout, or huff, or stamp your feet, or give out moody looks, or sigh heavily, or say ‘yes’ but mean ‘no’….

    We all sulk from time to time and when we do we tend to behave in the same way that we did as a small child. When we’re grown up this replaying of feelings, thoughts and behaviours from when we were small is called; being in our Child Ego State. This is sometimes shortened to ‘being in our Child.’

    What is an Ego State?

    Put simply, an Ego State is a metaphor for a collection of behaviours. Because we can’t see inside our heads we need to find ways of labelling clusters of related behaviours and the term ‘Ego State’ does that for us. The Child Ego State refers to the collection of experiences we logged as a young person and which we now use as we make our way through life. Some estimates suggest that about 80% plus of our current behaviour is a repetition of our development up to the age of five or six, by which time we had learned how to play, solve problems, use social graces and table manners, have fun, be creative, be affectionate, get our own way and keep ourselves safe (from the scary big people). Or not. Or to a greater or lesser level.

    We are Ourselves

    We decided what information to take in, what worked for us and what to alter and the Child Ego State is an embodiment of ‘us’. This means that we might be different from our siblings, who although may have been raised in the same environment, decided on their own way of going about things. I think this is an important point because we are not simply a facsimile of our environment and parents – we have been influenced and we made choices for ourselves. Therefore, the implication is that we have to take responsibility for our actions and not try to pass the buck back down the family tree.

    So What?

    Knowing about Ego States is useful because they help us to act in awareness and either enjoy being ‘us’ or allow us to make changes to our behaviour. Pause for a moment and think about all the times when you may have been in your Child Ego State so far today? Some useful clues are:

    1. When you felt young again.

    2. When your were doing what you were told (or rebelling), or being carefree.

    3. When your actions could be viewed as being similar to those of a five year old.

    4. When you were being your own little self, just getting on with stuff in your way.

    I have a large Child Ego State (people can vary in the size of theirs, relative to their other Ego States) and will muck about, choose my breakfast cereal based on how fun it looks, sing in the car on the way to a client and thoroughly resent being asked to do the washing up. In all of these bursts I am most definitely in my Child. I giggle when I’m writing a naughty word (bum) and I love the accurate use of foul language to get a laugh, make a point, or underscore a client’s miserable experience. This can be great fun, challenging and offensive. I have to work hard sometimes to rein it in and if you read my current book you will see there is no swearing, because that would be inappropriate. However, and the publisher hasn’t twigged yet, the book does contain odd words such as C3PO, Christmas, Cincinnati and a guest appearance by King Arthur, that I buried in there, purely for amusement. Knowing about my Child Ego State enabled me to do a thoroughly professional writing job and have a bit of fun at the same time.

    That’s the point of the Ego States, which also include Parent and Adult. They are a fantastic framework for observing behaviour, mapping conversations, building teams, improving leadership styles and making long lasting developmental changes.

    Our Task For This Week

    Is to…spot our sulking and instead of wallowing, catch it and make decision to ask for what we need. We can choose to wash the dishes and be helpful and be positive about it. And we can ask for a hug, or bring cakes for our team and have some fun.

    FREE Sample Book…at last a book written for the UK/European market!

    Do you know someone who is looking for work and needs a hand? Or is about to be made redundant and needs to make a start in sorting out their CV? Marshall Cavendish have put together a sample ebook of Job Hunting 3.0 which features the whole of the first section called ‘Getting Started’ and the whole of the final section called ‘Checklists’ containing (no surprises here) useful checklists full of interview questions, process tips and essential information for success. If you would like an exclusive copy; email me, subscribe to the blog, or use the contact box and I will zap a copy right back to you.

    Pass It On

    If you know someone who would be interested in this blog post please forward it to them, or ReTweet it, or let them know they can subscribe to regular emails via the box on the homepage.

    By The Way… FREE CRANFIELD COURSE ANYONE?

    +++NEWS we’re still collecting CVs and places are filling up so please apply quickly+++ At Cranfield University we’re running an Enhanced Personal Development Programme, starting 3rd September and lasting for 4 weeks. If you know someone who is unemployed (or about to be made redundant) and who would like to learn about job hunting skills, management skills and have fun on a real consultancy project then contact me now. Places are limited and an opportunity to spend 4 weeks full-time at one of the best universities in the world is not to be missed. I’m the Programme Director and one of the lecturers, so I can vouch for the excellence of it!

    Thank you for reading to the end and remember to begin spotting when you’re in your Child.

    Next week is a brief introduction to the Parent Ego State…which is another archaic Ego State. We will meet the term: Introjected. It’s more interesting than it sounds, trust me.