When we look at others who are engaging in self-destructive behavior, the easiest way for us to understand what we are looking at is to relate it to our own experience, as we often have more compassion and understanding for ourselves than for the other guy. If I’m judging someone who has lost everything to an addiction, or illegal or illicit behavior, etc., and I’ve never come close to being caught up in anything of that nature – this may sound like it makes no sense. You may say that your procrastinating, overeating, drinking too much caffeine, not getting enough sleep, spending money you had vowed you would put away in savings, picking at a pimple, or speeding is totally different than losing your family because you were caught cheating, came home drunk – again – or are in jail. Obviously, the two comparisons are very different – but only in degrees. There is great distinction in those degrees, but there is also the key to understanding others who seem so far or foreign to our own experience, in those degrees as well.
If we take a look at the reasons, motivations or struggles that underlie our own more “minor” self-destructive behaviors, we will see a template for almost all of the self-destructive behaviors that we deem to be incomprehensible. If one overeats, is it because she wants to gain weight, because she likes how the food tastes, or because being full feels so much better than feeling hungry? If someone has too much caffeine on a regular basis, are they thinking to themselves, “Yay, I’m so excited to be mistreating my body,” or are they more likely rationalizing the behavior or in denial, a common component in more severely self-destructive behaviors? In the case of caffeine, denial would manifest itself in the form of saying or thinking, “I need it so that I can be more productive. It’s not really so bad because it’s enabling me to be more available to career and family, and how bad is excessive amounts of coffee, anyway?” This doesn’t actually sound much different than the woman who told me that she thinks her acting out with other men outside of her marriage made her have more patience for her husband, with whom she didn’t really feel compatible with, and “isn’t it a good thing if I can be a better wife to him, certainly a better alternative than divorcing with five children in the mix?” Though the actual behaviors are vastly different, the reasons that drive both of these behaviors and keep them going are very similar.
There are still other similarities. Surely some of you reading this have gone above the speed limit or ran a red light, and were thinking along the same lines as the cheating spouse: “I won’t get caught,” or the white collar criminal: “It’s not so bad.” Perhaps people engage in some of the “minor” self-destructive behaviors because of how it makes them feel, or as a coping mechanism that provides relief. Think about anyone you know who goes on a shopping outing for no particular good reason. I’m not referring now to addictive spending or breaking the bank, just an instance of spending money we weren’t planning to, or had wanted to put away, and bought something we really had no need for in the name of “retail therapy.” Maybe the person spending unnecessarily just couldn’t cope with the laundry and the cleaning so she ran away for the day on a shopping trip to feel free of responsibility, and to try and get that thrill one often feels when finding and purchasing retail items. On a surface level, this isn’t very different than the person who self-harms, be it by cutting, piercing or tattooing, in an effort to relieve something, or to be able to feel something that she can’t feel doing anything else.
Some of you, dear readers, are now well and truly horrified at the parallels I am drawing. And it’s true that, obviously, there are more complicated details and nuances to addictions, illicit sexual behavior, physical self-harming behavior, and so forth. But when we judgmentally wonder why that is the outlet, why that person can’t get the same relief the way we do, whether it’s with a little speeding, shopping, or caffeine – those are not the thoughts of someone who wants to understand the other person. Those are the thoughts of someone who wants to distance him/herself from these issues, which can be understandable, as some of these behaviors are extremely offensive or frightening. But I think that the main reason we distance ourselves from understanding these issues, is fear.
If, in the interest of understanding someone else and their struggles, we concede that we aren’t really different, we are forced to face a variety of difficult truths. For those with a poorer self-concept, the idea that they are not that different than someone who is unfaithful is an intolerable thought. Their shaky self-esteem can’t allow them to think that way because they aren’t confident in their personal identity. Others struggle to accept this notion of similarity because, on some level, they recognize that they aren’t doing much to really change their own self-destructive ways. They then fear that this means they have to be tolerant and accepting of others and their self-destructive ways. For this type of person, the thought process goes something like this: “If I need the behavior to change, then I have to be angry and judgmental about it being bad. If I’m understanding and compassionate, then that means I won’t hold you accountable for change.” Again, the person’s poor understanding of boundaries doesn’t allow them to hold and experience both the concept of compassion and limit-setting, which for them makes judgment important to hold onto.
If we could all expand in ourselves the capacity and the boundaries to be able to have compassion while having a sense of limits in terms of what we can tolerate for ourselves, we would probably go a much farther way towards being able to help those around us whose self-destructive behavior is crippling them. People are much more likely to hear from us when they feel heard and understood in their challenges rather than judged and distanced because of them.