Do you ever have an irresistible urge to correct someone’s misbehavior or give great advice? The answer seems obvious and we can’t wait to be helpful but either our great wisdom is ignored or the person becomes defensive.
Or, have you ever tried to comfort someone and they reject your attempts to make them feel better? If fact it seems they feel worse after your positive attempts to cheer them up.
You may wonder why you had the urge to even try but the principle of the “righting reflex” helps explain.
Imagine a cat dropped upside down. As the cat flies through the air, it will turn and automatically land on its feet. This feat is accomplished by the righting reflex, which is an impulse that corrects the orientation of the cat and returns it to normal upright position. Because of this reflex, the cat is unharmed. 
Many of us have feel the righting reflex when others are making mistakes. We try to right them, because it appears they are in a free fall. It works for cats but unfortunately, people often have the opposite reaction when we attempt to right them. They vigorously reject our corrections and either defend or go the opposite direction. So how can you prevent a free fall?
How do you stop momentum?
When you are driving on ice and begin to swerve, your natural impulse is to slam on the breaks and stop the momentum. Your fear wants immediate control.
But as any experienced driver can attest, attempting to stop swerving on ice will lock the wheels and send the vehicle spinning out of control. The best choice is to turn the steering wheel into the direction of the spin and the car will naturally come out of the roll. Psychologists this action, “rolling with resistance.”
Roll With Resistance
This concept makes sense with physics but it also works in psychology. For example, suppose an addict comes into my office and is ambivalent about quitting drugs. If my response is a full brake slamming, “Don’t do drugs, you must quit!” which seems like a reasonable response, their brain responds, “Well, drugs are not that bad” and they begin to argue with my position. Or if a teenager complains about their life and we respond with,”It’s not that bad, at least you aren’t starving,” their brain responds, “You don’t understand me, my life is hard.”
Ignore The Your Natural Impulse
Just like controlling a vehicle on ice, if you turn into the emotion and go with the direction of the negative energy, the response can be surprisingly different. For example with the drug using client, if I lean into it I would say, “Well, I can understand why drugs seem like a reasonable choice to you.” If there is true ambivalence in the client’s mind, they will respond, “I need to quit, drugs are harming my life.”
Or with a teenager, turning into it would look like, “It sounds like you feel discouraged today.” Rolling with the resistance allows them to turn into it and they may say,”Well, I guess others have it worse.”
Go With The Mo
Going with their momentum is more powerful because the person is then allowed to speak for change instead of you. As they feel free to speak, if there is any desire to change, they will right themselves. Remember the cat, it self corrected.
Teenagers And Self Will
Parents are often caught off guard when their child enters the teen years and begins to express their own views. Psychologists call this phase “separation and individualization” but it scares parents and often they slam on the breaks. Parents say things like, “My child won’t get bad grades, my child will never miss school, my child won’t have a bad attitude, etc. and then they attempt to right the problem. The situation escalates, spins out of control and the child gets defensive.
The Superiority Trap
It can be especially challenging to “roll with resistance” when we feel our judgment is superior. We have the attitude, “I’ll take over now, thank you.” Our superior attitude creates feelings of inadequacy in the other person. Their ego screams out, “Heck NO!” and they become contrary regardless of the compelling evidence you present. It seems counter intuitive but there is good research supporting this method. Try it—you may be surprised at the results. After all, as Bern Williams said, “Unsolicited advice is the junk mail of life,” which is why sharing well-intentioned wisdom often fails.
Camille Curtis Foster LCSW
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Other Posts: https://provocounselingcenter.net/concerns/child-development/
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References:
Miller, W. R., & Rollnick. S. (2002). Motivational interviewing: Preparing people for change). New York: Guilford Press.
MARK DODD, Motivational Interviewing Ideas for Peer Mentor, electronic retrieval, https://www.niatx.net/toolkits/system/IA_MIforPeerMentors.pdf
http://educateria.com/2013/01/18/resist-the-righting-reflex/
