From One Extreme to Another
Real empowerment lies in the gray area, where boundaries fluctuate and are context- and relationally-dependent.
There’s a compelling pattern that shows up when people begin to grow from a particular place they are trying to change; often, they leap from one extreme behavior or circumstance to another. My research on this topic comes from observing myself and others. What I’ve noticed is this: when we evaluate our own patterns of behavior, and subsequently try to implement positive change, we tend to replace that pattern with one that is different but equal in its intensity. We flock to what feels familiar, especially in the midst of change—whether we have intended for those changes to occur, or life has organized them for us. In short, it is very hard for most humans to live in gray area: we want a distinctly colored box of ‘what to do and how to think’ to sit in.
Colloquially, evaluating our patterns and trying to change them is referred to as ‘repatterning,’ ‘deconditioning,’ ‘healing,’ ‘rewiring’, ‘unpacking’, or even ‘awakening.’ In layman’s terms, ‘growing’ will suffice. Whatever you want to call it, it is simply the process of changing something that isn’t working for you anymore. Like, for instance, deciding to address your addiction, neuroses, relentless flakiness, or that you keep choosing terrible partners.
Sometimes, the initiation of this process can be extreme, as is the case of a drug addiction leaving you at rock bottom; other times it is simply spurred by the desire to live a more satisfying or fulfilling life, which requires acknowledging how you are holding yourself back. Further still, other sweeping changes, like a death or a birth, may similarly leave you with the choice of how to change—or rather, with how to repattern your patterns.
Let us take the People-Pleaser as a way to exemplify the phenomenon of trading one extreme for another, since it is easy to recognize this archetype in ourselves. most of us have been a doormat, to lesser or greater degrees. As I wrote about earlier this year1, in response to
from “Honestly Unorthodox”, people pleasing often arises from an inability to sit with discomfort; more specifically, discomfort regarding what would happen if you act in congruence with what you want, rather than what you think the other person wants. People-pleasers often have difficulty being honest because they appraise others’ feelings as more important than their own.When a people-pleaser starts to “unpack” their people-pleasing behaviors, usually in response to realizing that they’re unhappy with the effects of such behaviors, they typically start placing boundaries everywhere. Everything becomes a pressurized situation in which they absolutely must follow the whims of their inner needs and desires. Although boundaries are certainly necessary and can be helpful, especially when someone has previously had none, the recovering people-pleaser will go overboard with their boundaries, and cling to phrases they don’t believe yet, like “I don’t owe anyone anything” and “I’m not responsible for anyone’s feelings” to help get them through.
(To be clear, I was this person; chanting these kinds of phrases to myself and slapping “boundaries” everywhere I went. This stage was an essential part of my growth; and, it was only a stage.)
This boundary overload can be something of a protective factor—people-pleasers have a hard time dealing with uncomfortable emotions from others. They may feel pressure to appease others because their own sense of self-worth is tied up in how others feel about them, or in their usefulness to others. Therefore, placing boundaries everywhere acts as a sort of buffer from discomfort: instead of existing in the gray of the present moment, they “boundary” people and experiences away, creating a sense of pseudo (or at least, short-lived) empowerment.
Cutting people out of your life, strictly adhering to your personal feelings in every given moment, and denying experiences that may impede the arbitrary boundary you created will not get you far. It feels like growth at first, but eventually stagnates: it is easier to trade one way of trying-to-control-life for another, because that is what we are used to. As any people-pleaser will tell you, it is much harder to sit in the unclear, unpredictable gray area of prioritizing yourself while not being an overly-boundaried asshole.
The real empowerment, as I see it, is being able to sit in the gray area, where boundaries fluctuate and are context- and relationally-dependent. Real empowerment is being able to tolerate someone you don’t care for without letting them get to you; it is choosing to help out a friend in need even though you’re tired; it is honoring how you feel while still being a kind person. Your actions do affect others, and caring about other people’s feelings can be a great strength. You can still act with integrity while occasionally self-sacrificing. Let us practice tolerating discomfort and living in the gray.
. .
This same sort of pattern—having difficulty accepting and living in the gray—plays out in almost every type of person. (Except for the people, I guess, who just dance easily with moderation and balance?)
So many of us just love to swing radically from one side of the spectrum to the opposite side: take, for instance, the growing number of former vegans turned carnivore diet adherents (aka ‘primal living’, ‘protein forward’, or ‘paleo’). Or, consider the former elite academics who have turned into conspiracy theorists (who still have thousands of followers, mind you). Consider how many people who were raised in religious orthodoxy turn to atheism or to a cult. Former athletes often either funnel their energy into an alternate form of great productivity, or steer down the couch potato route once they’re no longer accountable to their team. People I know who attend Alcoholics Anonymous report that when you first commit to sobriety, there is a sort of obsession with the program—an almost dogmatic devotion to working their recovery.
Obviously, we look at some of these changes as overwhelmingly positive, especially in the case of trading addiction for sobriety. We also look at some as veering more negative, like in the case of making a living off of generating conspiracies. However, each are examples of the same kind of pattern: a desire to not face the gray area, but find another distinctly colored and rule-lined box to be in.
In all of these cases, eventually, you can eventually move to a place that feels less rigid or extreme, and find your footing in that good, soft, nuanced ground. This place indeed exists, and is not distinctly black or white, but gray.
. .
I’ve come up with a few contributing factors while speculating about why we flock to extremes. One factor regards where you find meaning and purpose: if you attach your purpose to a group or a specific part of your identity, it becomes easier to transfer that purpose to a different identity or group. Or, it may just be human nature to go to what feels comfortable amidst change; to want to control and find answers; to want to know the right way to think and do and be. It makes sense that we often feel comfortable trading one set of rules for another.
The thing to remember is that growth is a continuous, nonlinear process that has no rules. If we find ourselves rigidly following rules, it’s a sign there is more work to do.
The tastes I’ve gotten of gray area are initially frightening (no rule-book to tell me what to do?) but with time, it feels…free. It actually feels liberating to occupy a more nuanced space. And while I am sure I will constantly be jumping from one distinctly colored box to another, I am also sure I’ll find my way out of them.
If you are currently inhabiting a distinctly colored box, which you moved to from another distinctly colored box: consider that there is something soft and gray beyond it. Go toward that and see how it feels.
Maggie
P.s. Hello and welcome to my new subscribers! I’m so glad you’re here.