My New Year’s Intention - Balancing My Self Orientation

coach as instrument coaches emotions newsletter relationship self-orientation we-i profile Feb 12, 2024

"Your pain is in the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding." – Khalil Gibran

Some patterns are hard to break, even when we know what they are.

I recently processed an issue with my CEO roundtable. I wasn’t so much looking for advice as much as wanting to be heard and validated by my peers. And what I got was a glimpse of a deeply rooted pattern that was re-emerging under stress.

The Pattern

I shared with my peer group an experience of feeling hurtfully taken advantage of by someone. And as I shared my story, I could hear my Self Orientation coming through. (Self Orientation to be explained further below).

In the relationship that I spoke of, (I felt) I’d been generous. I’d been kind. I’d been accepting and understanding of missed expectations. I kept hoping things would get better. I needed things to get better. I believed that I couldn’t afford to alienate this person who wasn’t showing up to their part of the relationship.

And though I’d been kind and generous and accepting, I’d also, in a way, stopped being honest, with myself and the other person. I stopped naming the reality of what wasn’t working. I withheld my concerns, silenced my normally direct nature. I explained away what wasn’t working by taking responsibility for it. Things would surely get better when I got “better”.

The more I talked about my experience of this relationship, the more I could see how this pattern had shown up in past relationships in ways that hurt me and cost me dearly. I felt angry with the other person and angry with myself in equal measure.

As I get some distance from and reflect on my experience, I can give us both some grace, realizing that we were both simply doing the best we could at the moment. We both felt a degree of risk and we both were shaped by the experiences of our past to protect and defend ourselves and cope with the situation as best we could.

Self Orientation

I was demonstrating a clear Self Orientation - meaning, when stress or conflict arises in a relationship, I look to myself for responsibility, I bury my objections, I defer to the other person and trust too much.

Learning in Action data indicates that about 60% of the population (at least across the US and Canada) are Self Oriented to one degree or another.

Those of us who are Self oriented can be great workers (because we take on what we are responsible for as well as what others are responsible for), we tend not to blame others, we tend to be conciliatory, However, we can take on too much (believing we must), become overwhelmed and resentful and be taken advantage of by not setting healthy boundaries of what’s OK and what isn’t in a relationship.

Because I teach this, I understand that my Self Orientation developed in my family of origin and has a direct connection to my attachment style. And though going against my Self Orientation by focusing more on the Other can feel so wrong in the moment, it can bring more agency and honesty to my relationships in the long run and contribute to a more conscious life for me.

My 2024 Intention

As I consider my intentions for 2024, continuing to bring balance and wholeness to my Self orientation is at the forefront. I plan to bring more conscious awareness to my relationships, to voice my concerns, to name the reality, to look for how the other person is contributing to what’s not working in the relationship and not just where I’m at fault. I’m going to be more courageous in my honesty, while continuing to be kind and generous and trust that the Universe is holding me.

I don’t expect this will be easy or pain free. And I’m more committed to my own emotional, psychological and spiritual growth than I am to my own comfort.

What About You?

Does my pattern sound familiar to you?

Does some of it mirror your own experience? Does it sound like how you experience your spouse or best friend or significant other?

If you aren’t a WE-I Practitioner and would like to learn about your Self/Other orientation, you can do so by taking the only assessment in existence that measures it, Learning in Action’s WE-I Profile.

"What you are aware of you are in control of; what you are not aware of is in control of you.” — Anthony de Mello

It’s been said that 95% of our thoughts each day are the same as the day before. That’s because we are all influenced by our past experiences and we develop patterns of thinking based upon those past experiences. And we can be pretty sure we are “right” about those thoughts.