I couldn’t understand some parts of this article, but it sounds interesting…

http://www.businessballs.com/consciouscompetencelearningmodel.htm

Enjoy, Doug

I give talks on positive psychology, but wonder whether people will act! From your comment, I realized that, especially with experienced professionals, they’ve gotten very comfortable being unconsciously competent. Their first reaction at the suggestion they might need to be consciously incompetent is, “No!” For lawyers, unfortunately, this often means we deploy the skills in which we are unconsciously competent (adversarial advocacy, zero-sum negotiations) in situations where they are inappropriate and ineffective and then wonder why we don’t get better results. But, I think we also resist even admitting that we might need to master another set of skills. We don’t want to experience concious incompetence, so we have no chance of moving on to any form of competence!

Again, thanks for the insight! (And, if anyone has feedback on whether I’m on the right track here, I’d appreciate it!)

I don’t know if there is any empirical research behind this — I’ll have to look. I found it very interesting to contemplate.

Great reminder. In the last week, I gave flowers to someone for being a great teacher on Mother’s Day and her response was “you shouldn’t have done that”. Then to another, I expressed admiration of the nice brooch she wore on and her response was “oh I can’t even remember where I got this”. To both, like you I had said ‘just say thank you’ and I received whispered thank-you’s offered rather sheepishly

Where does the aversion or careful avoidant response stem from? Is it modesty? Is the intention to deflect attention?

I used to think it was an Asian thing. My elders used to respond with ‘we have such an ugly child’ when anyone remarked on how cute any child in the family was - lest the ’spirits’ became jealous and cause harm to the child. As we grew up, ‘what a nice dress’ evoked ‘it’s a cheap one’ from us too. On the other hand, responding to another’s good fortune tend to be effusive albeit oftimes superficially and with a hint of envy.

Is ACR mood-dependent or situational? Do we have a particular way of responding to different people? These self observations may add to our self-understanding.

I will do the two assignments to answer my own questions

Warm regards,
Sulynn

But I love this article because you were able to take a look at ACR in a new way, and one that I find many people struggle with. In fact, I’m writing this right now in a short break between two clients — one male and one female — who both struggle with accepting compliments. I often have to force them to stop our conversations and notice what they did with some praise I offered, and how bad it felt to have it dismissed so quickly by them. Often, these folks need to learn how to “savor” good things in new ways, and can be helped with conscious work around listing their blessings and achievements on a daily basis, and then going through them with a person who is authentic with them.

This also reminds me of the old Dale Carnegie story in “How to Win Friends and Influence People” about how one of the kindest things we can do for each other is to notice something to compliment in others, and to make it a sincere, honest comment without any BS. It feels great to give compliments like that, but you point out how important it is for them to be received in the spirit they are offered.

Best,
Caroline

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