Who Me? Entitled?

I’m about all burned out on Entitlement. Reading four books about entitlement in the past three weeks has maxxed me out! I need to take a break from it.

You see, I’m preparing for a parenting workshop August 19^th called “Entitlement: Beat It!” In getting ready for this workshop I’ve read The Entitlement Cure by Townsend, re-read Raising Grateful Kids in an Age of Entitlement by Welch and The Collapse of Parenting by Sax. The other night I started The Narcissism Epidemic by Twenge & Campbell. Today, well, my brain reached overload.

So I decided to write a blog about Entitlement, hmnmmm, was that smart?! Let me share a little of what I’m learning. Now, I’ve been watching the entitlement movement grow for two decades. I taught my classes back at Bethany the word “Entitlementitis” before it was popular to talk about it.

Did you know that there are four legs that Entitlement rests on?

 1) The permissive parenting and self-esteem focused education. Fewer boundaries are set by families, and teachers tell kids that they are “stars” and “winners” even as performance stays stagnant.

 2) The media culture of shallow celebrity. Celebrity culture tempts people with the idea of fame- fame awarded for the amount of attention drawn to themselves rather than actual accomplishment.

3) The Internet: it’s a conduit for individual narcissism. It allows people to present an inflated and self-focused view if themselves to the world, and encourages them to spend hours each day contemplating their images.

 4) Easy credit, which make self-focused dreams become reality. It serves as a personal Fairy Godmother who makes wishes come true. (The Narcissism Epidemic)

My workshop will address the first one, but we have all four to overcome if we want to turn responsible.

First of all we need to see where we are entitled ourselves. Townsend says we all have “Pocket Entitlement” that rears its ugly head from time to time. So, how do we get rid of that? He stresses that we can’t do it alone! We need to fix out “inner structure” so that it’s disciplined, being ruthless with our instant gratification mentality.

He lists five obstacles to making progress:

Isolation – Don’t get into a grandiose sense of self sufficiency.

Life problems - Don’t wait for life to get easy!

Extremism – Don’t be a sprinter, impatient for it all to be fixed, rather get rid of an all or nothing attitude.

Self-judgment – A harsh inner judge can derail the process. Grace for your failures neutralizes self-judgment so we can fight another day. 

Triggers- Figure out which triggers you’re vulnerable to and prepare for them. A few examples are boredom, not seeing results fast enough, a temporary relapse, friends who want you to drop your structure and go play with them. (The Entitlement Cure, p. 119ff)

Next we need to see the problems caused by false or inflated self-esteem. (Yes, we all have it, though it’s easiest to see in other people!) Probably the biggest problem which I’ve found all four of my books agree with is: the entitled person is deathly afraid of taking a risk and failing. If he does fail, it cripples one’s ability to fail well, and hampers their capacity to learn and grow from failure.

Here are a few skills to help you develop the self-image that will take you through hard times:

1.     Create a self-image table with four columns: True Positives, True Negatives, False Positives, and False Negatives. List five aspects of how you see yourself (or have seen yourself) in each. For example, in True Positives I would write “Gentle with others.” In True Negatives I would put “Get distracted when things get difficult.” In False Positives I would list “Think I am better than others sometimes.” In False Negatives, “Get hopeless when I fail at something.”

2.     Meditate on Psalm 139 and Romans 3. These are two passages that define self-image accurately. One says how we are a wonderful creation, and the other tells us that we have a tendency to go our own way and forget who God is. Both are necessary.

3.     Ask three safe people in your life to look at your list from #1. Ask them if they will “not rescue me from the negatives, but rather will stick by me in my course of self-improvement.” (Townsend p. 135)

So, if we can get this far, how great! Our children, friends, siblings, colleagues will all benefit.

 Oh, and if you live in the Twin Cities and are a parent or a grandparent, come to the workshop. I have boatloads of parenting material to give you. Respond to my email to register.

But for now, I need to focus on something else. Like reading Pu der Bar auf Deutsch. That always gets my mind off of whatever is weighing me down...