Dr. Stuart Ablon
speaker
223 appearances
1 recordings
1 series
first heard Dec 2024
last heard Dec 2024
Dr. Stuart Ablon’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.
Trend
recordings per month · last 12 monthsNo recordings in the last 12 months.Older appearances are listed below; set an alert to hear about the next one.
Appearances
That's when you're going to collaborate to try to solve the problem, work together to try to solve the problem, and this is an important phrase, in a mutually satisfactory way. So you're going to work together to solve it in a way that works well for the both of you. Okay. And we're going to need to go into detail about that option. Okay. Third option.
plan C. Plan C is when you decide to drop it, drop your expectation, or in essence, solve the problem the way they want it solved. When they want it solved. Not forever, but just for now. And what's really important about that is it's a strategic choice. It is not giving in
Giving in, actually, most of the time is when you try to use plan A and make somebody do what you want them to do and they don't do it. And then you throw up your hands and say, fine, forget it. Right. That's failed plan A leading to bailing. Yes. Plan C is being strategic. Plan C is saying, you know what? We got like 10 problems to solve here. Can't solve them all at once.
I'm going to just drop this one for now.
So those are your three options. Impose your will, plan A. Collaborate to solve the problem, plan B. Drop it. Got it. Plan C. Okay. And the first thing I tell parents or anybody, this could be a manager in a workplace, is, all right, list out the problems you have, which with as much specificity as possible.
Be as specific as possible which problems you're talking about, like a kid won't get out of the bed, won't get out of bed, et cetera, okay? And just decide, how do you want to handle it? A, B, or C? And that should be informed by what you're trying to accomplish. That's basically step one. It is step one.
And it depends what you're trying to accomplish because plan A, imposing your will, it may get your expectation met. Right. But it might get very ugly on you. Right. It might harm the relationship. Yep. And there's no skills that are being developed by imposing your will upon another human. Okay? Yeah.
Yes. But let me make one clarifying comment here. List out the things that are frustrating you. That's going to look like a list of behaviors that are frustrating you. And then just sort of put that aside, get it out of your system. I want you to really make a list of the specific situations in which those frustrating behaviors are happening, okay?
So your list should not look like disrespect, screaming, crying, running out of the room. It should look like, when's that happening? Over what? What are the triggers, the precipitants, the situations, okay? Because that's really what you want to prioritize with these three plans.
Okay, so plan A, we talked about that. Plan C, when would you choose plan C? Plan C is going to keep things calm. So if you just want to avoid a meltdown or avoid a challenging situation for now, it'll do that. The problem is the problem lives on, right? Your expectations haven't been met. Skills aren't built by just avoiding something temporarily.
Correct. And I was thinking about that as well, because you talk about in the book how let them is not giving in. It's not sort of ceding. It's actually a very mindful action. It's strategic. And for parents, by the way, when we talk about plan C, I always ask people a trick question. I'm like, with plan C, who's in charge? And they usually say, the kid. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, no.
You are still every bit as in charge as a parent because you're deciding not to pursue this. Yes. For now.
You got it. And you're choosing not to, if you're not going to pursue an expectation that's been leading to challenging behavior, you're going to reduce challenging behavior.
It really involves any form of challenging or concerning behavior. I always go back to anything somebody's doing you don't want them to do or not doing you want them to do.
We talked in depth about Plan A and Plan C. We didn't talk in depth about the most important plan, which is Plan B. What does that look like? So that's when you're collaborating to solve a problem together with a kid.
Absolutely. And so what you say to yourself, let's say the problem, the specific problem was that somebody you love is really struggling and not seeking help.
And again, that's a much more challenging one than perhaps a kid's not getting out of bed to go to school.
OK, am I going to try to impose my will and make them get treatment? Well, first of all, it's not going to work. OK, but it's going to have all those other downsides. Am I just going to drop it so that we're not having all this conflict? But of course, the problem's not solved. Or am I going to try to collaborate to solve the problem?
Because that option has you pursuing the thing you're worried about. trying to actually solve the problem so it won't keep rolling on, but there are other benefits. This is the only one of the three options where you're actually building that helping relationship I mentioned earlier that is the number one predictor of whether anybody's going to change their behavior anyways.
And here's perhaps my favorite thing about this, the ingredients to it, which we're about to talk about, if you just follow those ingredients, That's where the skills training happens. That's where people practice and develop their skills. Because this is going to seem really simple, but if somebody struggles with problem-solving skills, what's the best way to help them develop those skills?
Showing 121–140 of 223 · page 7 of 12
← Previous
Next →