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Maybe We Should Stop Believing Self-Control Is Good for Us
As children, we were taught to learn to control our actions and our emotions and that we’d be fine, but that may not always be the case.
The rules by which we have been taught to live may require a bit of retooling in light of recent research that is now touting psychological flexibility rather than simply control. But what does this mean, and is it something to which we can quickly adjust? Basically, it calls for the ability to survey the situation and make conscious decisions that should be the best ones for us, our future, and the lives of others inside or outside our circle.
Controlling our emotions and actions is appropriate, but being overly controlled works against us. Rigidly caving in to others, potentially learned in childhood as a defense against aggressive parents, can mean we succumb to the wishes of others in all instances, disregarding what may be best for us.
One specific new study points not to self-control as a means of promoting acquiescence but to aggression and retribution. According to the study, those who are the most aggressive do not seem to have personalities that are marked by a lack of self-control, and programs designed to increase self-control have not been successful in lowering violent tendencies. Rather, there is a wealth of evidence from the study that shows…
