Like you ,touch me softly, watch me with a sweet smile
Like you ,listen to me before you say something
Then, one day I will grow up to be a real man
――9 year old Bradley
Everyone is eager for touching and understanding, for having time to spend his life fully ,this is the physical and physiological need called hungers by the psychologist Berne.
The eager for touching and appreciation can be satisfied by the strokes. Strokes is a way to understand the behavior of others. In a connection of body language or a signal of understanding, such as a eye contact , a word ,a post or an action, they want to imply: I can feel as you feel.
The way of a man to make use of the time is decided by the degree of the eager for strokes. For example he may spend several minutes, several hours or even all life to get the strokes in all kinds of manners including psychological games. Otherwise, all he could do is to escape as a response to the strokes from others.
The eager for strokes
The baby can only be grow up naturally when he gets enough touch from others. This is always b satisfied through diapering, feeding, catapasm, strokes and hug by parents. In strokes, there are several substance, one of them is a chemical from the body of the baby which can promote the physical and mental development. If the baby was ignored or without enough strokes and caring ,he would suffer from the mental damage as well as the unhealthy body ,even lead to death.
The situations can be as serious as the malnutrition that danger the growth of the babies when they did not get natural touch after born ,or raised up with limitation freedom and taught under the theory that only the stick can lead to success ,for they have been deprived of a great number of opportunities of touching.
When it come to the communication there is a saying that if a baby grows up without touch ,even his spinal marrow would shrink. The following story can justified the significance of the touch.
When Susan was twenty two month she was left by her father in a big scale children hospital with 15 pound of the weight and 28 feet high(the weight of her only equivalent to a five month baby and the tall to a ten month baby ).Besides, she never developed any skills like crawl, speak or baby works ,and when some one approach her ,her would cry heavily and backward.
For a long time no one paid a visit to her ,so after three weeks the social work visited her mother. Though Susan’s parent has a high education background ,her mother compliant directly that her just didn’t like her ,for Susan did not want to be touched and like to stay alone. So , she was not will to take care of Susan anymore and admit that she had given up to look after Susan. Since there are no physiological reasons can account for the extremely slow response in her mental and physical development ,the only explain was that the complication caused by the missing maternal love .
For this ,the hospital found a woman who was willing to take care of Susan and gave her the feeling of be loved and cared. When the woman did this special job six hours a day and five days a week ,the other people work in hospital paid more attention to Susan as well, spending the time hugging her, shaking her, feeding her and playing with her which made her could obtain adequate strokes.
Two months later, the response of Susan still a little slow ,though ,her emotional development had achieved a lot. Her weight increased six pound and height two feet. And the biggest progress was her exercise capability that he could crawl ,work with the aid of floor. Besides ,she could communicate with the strange without afraid. All this attributed to the care she got from others.
When we grow up ,the eager for the touch would change into another form ——the eager for the appreciation. For this, the previous strokes can be replaced by a smile , a nod , a word , a frown or a posture. Just like the strokes ,the appreciation ,positive or negative , both can simulate the emotion to make you recognize the current situation of yourself. So , the appreciation as a strokes can prevent your sprite from shrinking.
Some people may need multiple appreciation to maintain the sense of safety and this can be everywhere ,at home ,at school ,even along with your jobs. For example , once in a industrial environment ,a manager complaint that one of his lab worker spent too much time on the drinking machine taking with others while paid no attention to his work. However, when this managed had a train of the communication analysis ,he changed his work pattern by applying the theory into his work. So , he spent more time taking with the lab work with a friendly tone. And the effect of this work was obvious that he came to the conclusion that the eager for the appreciation was needed by everyone no matter where he was. Therefore , if you want to be a successful manager ,you should know how to and when to conciliate and appreciate your works.
This is the instinct for keep safe when we are eager for the strokes ,positive or negative to prove our existence. And the ways of obtaining the strokes have some things to do with the obstacles in communication, the unsocial personality and the intimacy with others. If a person do not know how to express love it may because that when he was young he never had the chance to learn how to love ,or may no one taught him what is love and how to show it, or may never had such experience that was loving or being encouraged in his childhood. In the end , he took the ignorance for granted since love for him is something that did not need to be expressed or learn to express. So, he turned out be a person who ignore his own capability ,ohters’ feeling and the surrounding. And they are always bad at communication with parents and give the encourage to the parents, as love is concerned , they understand it with their own feeling from what they see.
One of my follower is from a single family. She was quite independent when she was young for the lack of maternal love ,so in her view the only truth is to be realistic and strong. In this case , she is not good at communication since part of the function of communication can only be learn from the motherhood. When she reported to me the tone sounded like a strict father and made me feel unconformable. However ,she self never realized this and which can easily lead to an obstacle in the workship and friendship. The controlling party of the communication is your counterpart ,the more you realize it ,the easier your communication will be. Most people who like to be alone is a kind of person who lack of the strokes.
Actually ,this is a auto pattern of the response to the outside and the doomed footnote to your life book, which can be embodied by the so called characteristics.
It is just missing love.
For missing love you would never know what love is.
There are so many people who may be this kind ,for a long time ,I was one of them.