Class hour on the topic: "Respect. Mutual assistance"

Where did respect disappear and how to get it back?

My wife doesn't respect me! I have lost respect for my husband! Respect for each other has disappeared in our relationship... - a family psychologist hears such complaints every day. If you ask any person what they would like from relationships with other people, I am sure that most often you will hear the word “respect.” The need for respect is a top priority for most people. Regardless of the nature of the relationship, age or gender, we are very sensitive when it comes to respect. Why? What does respect give us? To answer this question, let's try to define respect. It is quite difficult to give a simple and understandable definition right away, so let’s try to construct this definition.

1. Respect is the attitude of one person (group of people) towards another person (group of people)

2. This relationship is based on mutual recognition of the individual merits of each of these people (groups of people)

3. Recognition of the priority of their safety and non-causing harm: physical, psychological and moral

4. Recognition of their fundamental rights to freedom, expression, religion, etc.

As can be seen from our definition, respect is a whole complex of concepts that, oddly enough, affects our instinct of self-preservation! Now it becomes clear why in personal relationships the problem of loss / restoration of respect becomes one of the central ones. In order to understand what respect gives us, let's look at the diagram:

As can be seen from the diagram, for men (highlighted in blue) and for women (highlighted in red), the priority qualities in the concept of “respect” are different things. If for women the concept of “respect” lies in the emotional sphere, then for men it has a more practical meaning. Understanding these differences becomes especially important when we try to analyze what behavior and actions inevitably lead to a loss of respect for him or her. Before talking about the reasons for the disappearance of respect in relationships, let's think about how this concept is formed in a person in principle.

In order for a person to be able to respect others, he must have an appropriate upbringing based on mutual respect between men and women, children for parents, parents for children, as well as for other people. And one more important addition - this person must respect himself!

There is a very close connection between self-esteem and the respect of others. Surely many people know the axiom that it is impossible to achieve respect from others without respecting yourself. It is believed that a person’s self-esteem is divided into two components:

emotional - how I relate to myself from the perspective of “good and evil”, my assessment of myself as a “good” or “bad” person, and
rational - an indicator of my competence, professionalism, success. Note that both components that form self-esteem in men and women are different.

Let's look at the picture:

From the figure it becomes clear that we call respectful an attitude towards us that strengthens or, at a minimum, maintains our self-esteem.

Accordingly, I will regard “unfriendly” behavior that questions my competence or my assessment of myself as disrespectful. In relationships between a man and a woman, respect is closely related to gender-role behavior, or more precisely, to the expectation of certain behavior.

Let's look at a simple example. A man and a woman are driving in a car. We stopped. The man got out of the car, opened the door on the woman's side and helped her out of the car. The man showed respect for the lady (helped her out of the car), the woman showed respect for the man by waiting for him to come up to help her out, thanking him, thereby showing that she was confident in his good manners. Respect breeds respect.

Unfortunately, manifestations of disrespect begin with “little things”, the most typical of which are: lack of elementary gratitude at the level of “thank you”, inattention, failure to fulfill one’s promises, raising one’s voice. Of course, some will react to this, and some will not. Are you sure you know the saying that “little lies breed great mistrust”? The same can be said about respect - small manifestations of disrespect grow into big problems over time. Signs of chronic disrespect in men and women are presented in the following figure:

more typical for men

more typical for women

It is important to note that respect is lost not only when such behavior is shown directly to this person, but also to his relatives, friends or colleagues. My husband doesn't respect my mother! My wife doesn't respect my friends! From time to time, at a reception, I hear one or another client talk about the loss of respect for his wife/husband because of her/his disrespectful attitude towards relatives or friends. Indeed, we often associate ourselves with people close to us and tend to take into account what is not always directed directly at us. Why is this happening?

Belonging to a group (and family, friends, colleagues are a group) gives us an additional feeling of security and comfort, so disrespect for this “our” group automatically extends to us. In disconnected families, where there are no close emotional connections, this does not happen.

There are a number of behaviors that almost always cause long-term (if not permanent) loss of respect. They are well known: betrayal (treason), humiliation, insult, lies, violence.

Regardless of gender, a person who encounters such manifestations on the part of a partner instantly loses respect for him. It is extremely difficult to restore respect after such actions. This is due to the fact that each of these actions deeply wounds the self-esteem of the victim and causes him pain. Pain and respect are incompatible.

The peculiarity of respect is that earning it is much more difficult than losing it. In this sense, respect as a concept is close to trust.

What to do if you feel a loss of respect for yourself from your loved ones? Here's a simple step-by-step guide that can help you regain lost respect.

1. Look at yourself.

Analyze your behavior as “possibly wrong” towards the person. Maybe you violated his “boundaries”, doubted his value, or simply offended him... Not everyone is able to openly and immediately declare an incorrect attitude towards themselves. Unexpressed grievances do not go away. Having admitted the wrongness of your behavior, do not rush to immediately ask for forgiveness, but rather try to understand why (?) you did this. Without understanding the motives for your behavior, you risk repeating it in the future. The next stage of your analysis will be to find another way of acting that will not be perceived by your partner as disrespectful.

2. Start a dialogue.

Tell your partner how important their respectful attitude is to you and what it feels like when they don't. Don't make excuses or shift the blame from yourself to him. Admit your mistakes by simply listing them. Recognize a person’s right to be offended by you and change their attitude towards you.

3. Ask for forgiveness.

It is forgiveness, not apology. Not many people know that there are big differences between these two terms. Apology is a more formal, secular term. Its essence boils down to asking to take the apologetic person out of the “state of guilt.” Forgiveness is a more personal, if not intimate, term - its essence is a request to accept repentance.

4. Take action.

Regardless of whether you have been forgiven or not, your awareness of your mistakes must be transformed into new attitudes and actions. Remember that you first need to regain your respect for yourself and you are on the right track.

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Don't burden your karma)

Give compliments

Express love for your spouse through words and actions. Do it sincerely and from a pure heart. Any union is built on love, respect and trust. This is the basis of romantic and family relationships. Therefore, be sure to show affection, tenderness and kindness. See each other as unique individuals. Some spouses have the habit of comparing their partner to other people, but this is a huge mistake that humiliates your loved one, lowers his self-esteem, and negatively affects your union. If you want to treat your spouse with respect, then you must see him as a unique person with unique qualities. When you treat him or her as a special person, you will naturally show respect as a result.

Do you think you treat your spouse with respect?

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What is the right thing to do?

There are several ways to avoid negative statements, reactions and consequences. All you need is:

stop talking about a man in a negative way and even think badly about him, since, as they say, a thought is material - it can come true;
give up the intention to acquire an ideal - you cannot remake a person and remake him for yourself, because he is an individual with his own character, received from nature;
do not discuss your spouse with your girlfriends, since not all of them actually are like that - you are only giving them food for insidious joy and a desire to throw more wood on the fire, further escalating the situation;
not to consider oneself a victim who “got” the wrong betrothed from fate is an independent choice of a free woman;
learn to see in your husband his superiority and dignity compared to others - this will give him confidence and he will begin to succeed, he will spend less time lying on the sofa with the newspaper;
show respect to your loved one, show his importance in your personal life - then his success will only be a matter of time.

If you stop telling and thinking bad things about a man, then you can learn to calmly accept him as real - as he really is. Without biases and unnecessary expectations. Isn't there something like this? Consequently, something went wrong: they took a wrong turn, got off here, ended up in the wrong place.

Therefore, if your spouse’s behavior smacks of heartache in you, then you need to look deep into yourself. It is possible that you are the provocateur of such behavior. And the husband is just a mirror reflecting reality, that is, the woman next to him. On a subconscious level, this is a powerful impetus for inappropriate behavior that is annoying. It turns out that the wife, being an imperfection, makes her man to blame for everything. There is only one result - change urgently!

And further. By showing disrespect to your loved one, you automatically consider yourself better. This is how pride is cultivated, which breaks existing relationships and pushes towards a new, independent life. Family breakdown is another painful consequence. And if it persists, it is fictitious, since the couple turns into cohabitants, simply sharing the territory of existence.

Nothing to hide3

It's not just about not deceiving, not betraying and not lying. Sometimes partners are afraid to tell their loved one some bad news. They think they are doing a good thing because they don't want to stir up any worries. Sincerity in relationships is the basis. If a partner is not afraid to talk about problems or his own failures, this means that he trusts and is confident in the relationship. He knows that together with his half he can handle everything. This is also a sign that he respects his partner and takes her very seriously.

Why does disrespect arise?

Disrespectful behavior on the part of a man towards his wife is due to several factors:

this is a response to his wife’s behavior, perhaps she doesn’t respect him either;
the prerequisites are laid in childhood - probably the man, as a child, observed similar behavior in his own family;
the woman committed an offense that affected their relationship - deception, betrayal.

Operating principle of the mechanism

Now there are many opinions, including from practicing psychologists. For example, O. Torsunov claims that the way we women think about them, about men, is how they become. Well, let's tune in to the positive so that they change for the better and literally blossom! But if day after day you inspire a person that he:

rag;
not worthy of you;
a parasite, of which there are few;
Jonah;
incompetence and the like.

In the end, he will become just like that, because you subconsciously build a ceiling for him, above which a man, in the end, will not be able to jump. Because he doesn’t receive support, he’s not psychologically ready, or he’s simply given up, because “no matter how hard you try,” everything is useless.

Plus, a woman often forms a whole negative hollow around him, as she complains to her friends, neighbors, mother, relatives, acquaintances - in general, to everyone with whom she communicates. And they in return begin to consider the person much worse than he deserves. However, if the wife herself described him this way, then “that’s the way it is.” This is the main conclusion of all women's cries into a vest.

And then it becomes a vicious circle: they begin to whisper to her that “she married the wrong person,” “so-and-so was better,” “I feel sorry for you,” “poor thing, how you are suffering,” and so on. This heats up the nerves and pushes towards eternal dissatisfaction with the spouse or leads to the breakdown of the family. In general, support your man, never talk bad about him and don’t listen to idle conversations.