In this episode we’re talking to licensed clinical social worker and therapist Hope Eden.

Hope works with people who are experiencing relationship trauma or loss, life transitions, and negative emotions like anxiety, grief, anger or depression.

Today we’re talking about walking on eggshells, temperament testing, optimism bias, and something called the locus of control.

While you’re here, I’d be grateful if you would take our podcast sponsorship survey to help us find a sponsor for the show. It’s just a few questions and takes less than a minute!

Now let’s get to the interview!

Interview With Hope Eden About How (Not) To Walk On Eggshells

Brian: Hope, welcome to the show. We’re so glad to have you today.

Hope: Thanks for having me, Brian.

Brian: My pleasure. Let’s get right to my first question.

Question: What are some of the most helpful or foundational things you found that help the people that you work with?

Hope: In working with people for over sixteen years as a licensed clinical social worker, I’ve found that people often come with relational distress, anxiety, and depression that traces back to relational issues. One of the most foundational things that I’ve discovered is so basic that if I don’t lead up to it slowly and tell them that it’s so basic, that they could miss it if they’re not paying attention, is this – I’m going to pause right before I say then I’m going to ask the audience to really take this in – “I am me and you are you. I am me and you are you.”

I call it a reset button. It’s a way for people, when they’re having boundary issues or discomfort and relating to another person, to take a moment and say, ‘I’m me, he’s he. I’m me, she’s she. I’m me, they’re they,’ and get perspective and get centered within their own self in order to re-engage or make a decision to move away from the other person.

Brian: Yeah. It’s like setting that invisible wall of, ‘Here’s what I can take control of, here’s what I don’t have control of. I should live within my limit and have you live within a limit that doesn’t impose on mine at the same time.’ That’s a great way to say it.

Hope: Absolutely. Also, it helps to see yourself as a person, and the other as a person. It’s really important for that to happen because in order to have relationship, there must be two people. I look at it like – if we were circles, we must be even-sized circles in order to have relationship. If one circle is big to another person’s circle being small, then it is not possible to have relationship.

Brian: Yeah. There’s a visual that you can think about there; you are inside a circle, they’re inside a circle and they should be the same size, right?

Hope: Absolutely. Or even, they are the circle. In order to have a healthy relationship, the circles must be equal rather than different sizes.

Brian: Yeah, okay. That’s funny because on my Start Here page on my website, I have an illustration that has ‘You and Me’ inside of a circle (believe it or not). The illustration that we draw actually looks like this – in a healthy relationship; ‘You’ and ‘Me’ intersect a little bit. In the place where we intersect, we call that ‘Us.’ But in a codependent relationship, what it looks like is a small ‘Me’ inside of a bigger ‘You.’ So I am what you think of me and I am basically you (for lack of better way to say it), and I’m smaller than you and I’m basically inside you. That’s dangerous. I just remember that we have it on our Start Here page; what a great reminder.

Question: Earlier we were talking about concept that’s called the ‘locus of control’. There’s something called the ‘internal locus of control’ and the ‘external locus of control.’ Can you help our listeners understand what the can take away from this concept of the locus of control?

Hope: Imagine the two circles. Imagine the circle that is ‘you’ and then add arrows going out; that represents internal locus of control. This is when the place of control for me is within me. Locus of control is the ‘place of control’ and the internal locus of control is when the control is within me. The external locus of control would be the circle with arrows coming in toward the person who is represented by the circle and the control is outside of them. The locus of control is at a point outside of them – whether it’s a person, a situation, a circumstance – it’s a control or a motivator that is outside of the person.

What I do with that is help people use that as an assessment tool. I might ask, ‘Is this from a place of an internal locus of control or an external locus of control?’ Most people when asked will say, ‘I’d really like to come from an internal locus of control where I’m making my own decisions, operating as a ‘self’, and making determinations about my life.’ They’re coming from their own space, their own belief system, and their own values.

If they’re using this tool, they can say, ‘Am I being motivated by what’s outside of me or am I being motivated from what’s within me?’ If then they look at it like, ‘Okay, how do I move from outside to an inside place of control?’ then they can start taking steps.

A symptom of an external locus of control might be blame or resentment; that thing outside of you is causing you distress and you’re blaming that. That’s a sign of an external locus of control. That person may say, ‘How do I move to where I’m coming from within me rather than depending on what this person outside of me is doing?’

Brian: Right. You’re reminding me of something. I want to actually ask your input on this idea. As you say that, I remember talking to Christine Askew in episode 12 about codependency schemas. It seems to me that two of the four codependency schemas that she discussed would correlate with internal versus external locus of control – at least the two most obvious ones.

For example, Self-Sacrificers and Subjugators are two different brands of codependency. Self-Sacrificers are often the folks who sacrifice themselves, always trying to help another person fix another person, jump in there and save the day when someone else is in distress, and keep things on an even keel. Whereas subjugators have a lot of anxiety around personal safety. ‘I’m going to give you anything in order for you to stay.’  ‘I’m going to make sure that you’re pleased so that you’re not angry with me.’ ‘I’m going to make sure that all of your opinions of me are good because I don’t want to ruffle feathers. I have a lot of anxiety and I want to keep you happy.’ But the motivation for doing each of those is very, very different.

The Self-Sacrificer seems to have a high internal locus of control. They’re almost like a superhero coming in to save the day, very almost dominant, assertive, and very proactive whereas the Subjugator is more concerned about what the other person thinks.

They (Subjugators) don’t feel like they really have a lot of control at all. Or, they try to use the little control that they do have to keep themselves safe, but they’re so worried about what someone else thinks of them from the outside that they would seem to have an external locus of control. Does that make sense to you?

Hope: Yes. It sounds like there’s a high-risk based on those schemas of toxic bonding. Patrick Carnes talks about that in The Betrayal Bond. I think there’s also a risk of what I call ‘locus of control leapfrog’. It sounds like the Self-Sacrificer who’s coming from an internal locus of control becomes someone else’s external locus of control. Then the Subjugator might seek to have the other person dependent upon them by whatever it is that they’re offering so they become bigger.

Then there’s a back and forth, big circle to little circle, and the Subjugators may operate on the small circle side where they have an external locus of control. They seek means to regain some control, but they do it by seeking to get it from the outside. Does that make sense?

Brian: Yeah, it makes sense. Thanks for commenting on that. It just came to mind when you were describing the locus of control.

Question: Moving along, there’s a concept that a lot of people mention when they talk about having codependent tendencies of feeling like they’re ‘walking on eggshells’ all the time. They don’t want to ruffle feathers. What would you say to someone who feels that they’re always walking on eggshells?

Hope: I would ask that person, ‘How much could you possibly weigh to walk on eggshells and not break them?’ Because that’s what the goal is. If they say they’re walking on eggshells, my guess is they’re talking about whole eggshells that aren’t broken. The answer is you can’t weigh very much if you’re trying to walk on eggshells and not break