Gift : 12 Lessons to Save Your Life

by Edith Eger

  I suggested that maybe they weren’t the ones with the need. Maybe she was. Sometimes we have the need to be needed. We don’t feel we’re functioning well if we’re not rescuing people. But when you depend on being needed, you’re likely to marry an alcoholic. They’re irresponsible, you’re responsible. You re-create that pattern.

  I told Iris, “This is a good time for you to marry you. Otherwise, you’re going to make a bad situation worse, not better.”

  She was quiet, her expression disoriented. “That’s so hard,” she said. “I still feel guilty.”

  When they were children, her eldest sister was very angry and frightening. At the time, no one knew she had experienced sexual abuse. Iris would come home from school and lock herself in her bedroom to avoid her sister’s volatility. She and the other sisters would beg their parents, “Can’t you get rid of her? Can’t you control her?” One day the eldest sister had an enormous fight with their father and pushed him through a screen door. That was when their parents sent her to a girls’ home—and from there, her life became ever rockier.

  “I might have been the reason my parents chose to send her away,” Iris said.

  “If you want to have a loving relationship with your sisters,” I said, “it can’t be based on needing each other. It’s because you want each other. So, you can choose. Do you want to have guilt, or do you want to have love?”

  To choose love is to become kind and good and loving for you. To stop rehashing the past. To stop apologizing for not being there to save everyone. It means saying, “I did the best I could.”

  “But it feels like part of my whole life journey is to somehow find a solution to what happened to the three of us,” Iris said. “As the only person in my family who didn’t have a major struggle, I was the only one who could keep it together back then. And now I feel disloyal when I’m not helping them.”

  One of the first questions I ask patients is, “When did your childhood end?” When did you start protecting or taking care of someone else? When did you stop being yourself, and start filling a role?

  I told Iris, “You may have grown up very fast. You became a little adult, taking care of other people, being the responsible one. And feeling guilty that no matter what you did, nothing was enough.”

  She nodded, tears filling her eyes.

  “So now you decide: when is enough enough?”

  It’s difficult to relinquish our old ways of earning the A’s and discover a new way to build love and connection, one that hinges on interdependence, not dependence; on love, not need.

  When I’m trying to help a patient get at his or her early patterning I often ask, “Is there anything you do in excess?” We often use substances and behaviors to medicate our wounds: food, sugar, alcohol, shopping, gambling, sex. We can even do healthy things in excess. We can become addicted to work or exercise or restrictive diets. But when we’re hungry for affection, attention, and approval—for the things we didn’t get when we were young—nothing is ever going to be enough to fill the need. You’re going to the wrong place to fill the void. It’s like going to the hardware store to buy a banana. The thing you’re looking for isn’t there. And yet, many of us keep going to the wrong store.

  Sometimes we get addicted to needing. Sometimes we get addicted to being needed.

  Lucia is a nurse, and she told me she thinks it’s in her genetic code to focus on others, to ask, “What do you need? How can I help?” It took decades of marriage to a demanding man, stepping in to raise his children, including a daughter with disabilities, years of being told “Do this! Do that!” before she started to ask, “What about me? Who am I in this situation?”

  Now she’s learning to be more assertive, to stop disconnecting from her own preferences and desires. Sometimes it garners a rocky response from others. The first time she set a boundary with her husband, refusing to get up from the couch to fix him a snack, he yelled, “I ordered you!”

  She took a deep, stabilizing breath, and said, “I don’t take orders. If you speak to me that way again, I’ll leave the room.”

  She’s learning to recognize that the clinching feeling at the top of her gut when she starts to say yes to a request is a signal to stop and ask herself, “Is this what I want to do? Will I be resentful if I do this?”

  It’s good to be self-ish: to practice self-love and self-care.

  When Lindsey and Jordan were young, Marianne and Rob made a commitment to give each other solo nights away from the family scene. On Marianne’s night out, Rob agreed to be home with the kids, and vice versa. One week a famous economist was going to be visiting from London, and Rob wanted to hear him speak. But the event was on Marianne’s night out; she’d already purchased tickets to see a play with a friend, and he’d already made a commitment to be home with the kids. When he told Marianne he couldn’t find a babysitter on such short notice, she could have called her friend to reschedule, and contacted the theater to try to exchange their tickets for another night. We can always make the choice to accommodate, to be flexible. The problem is that many of us rush to fix and adjust out of habit. We take too much responsibility for others’ problems, training them to rely on us instead of on themselves, and paving our own way toward resentment down the road. Marianne gave Rob a kiss on the cheek and said, “Gosh, hon, it sounds like you have a dilemma. I hope you can figure it out.” In the end, he brought the children with him to the lecture and they played under the auditorium chairs in their pajamas.

  Sometimes life requires us to go with the flow, sometimes it’s the right thing to prioritize others’ needs, to modify our plans. And of course, we want to do everything in our power to support our loved ones, to be sensitive to their needs and desires, to engage in teamwork and interdependence. But generosity isn’t generous if we chronically give at the expense of ourselves, if our giving makes us a martyr or fuels our resentment. Love means that we practice self-love, that we strive to be generous and compassionate toward others—and to ourselves.

  I often say that love is a four-letter word spelled T-I-M-E. Time. While our inner resources are limitless, our time and energy are limited. They run out. If you work or are in school; if you have children, a relationship, friends; if you volunteer, exercise, or belong to a book club, support group, or house of worship; if you’re caring for an aging parent or someone with medical or special needs—how do you structure your time so you don’t neglect yourself? When do you rest and replenish? How do you create a balance between working, loving, and playing?

  Sometimes the hardest way to show up for ourselves is to ask for help. For a few years I’ve been dating a gentle man and a gentleman, Gene, my wonderful swing dance partner. When he had to be in the hospital for a few weeks, I visited every day, and he was happy to let me baby him a little—hold his hand, spoon-feed him meals. It’s wonderful when someone gives you the gift of giving. I was sitting with him one afternoon and noticed he was shivering. He admitted he’d been quite cold, but for Gene, kindness is number one, and he was so worried about coming across as demanding that he’d decided not to ask for a warmer blanket. In trying not to be a burden on anyone else, he neglected himself.

  I used to do that, too. In our early immigrant days, Béla and I lived with Marianne in a tiny maid’s apartment at the back of a house in Park Heights, Baltimore. We had arrived in the country penniless—we had to borrow the ten dollars to get off the boat—and struggled to feed our family. In tough circumstances, I held it as a point of pride to put food on Béla and Marianne’s plates first—to serve myself only if there was enough to go around. It’s true that generosity and compassion are vital to foster. But selflessness doesn’t serve anyone—it leaves everyone deprived.

  And being self-reliant doesn’t mean you refuse care and love from others.

  Audrey was home for a visit during her college years at the University of Texas, Austin, a hotbed of activism and progressive politics. She opened my bedroom door on a Saturday morning and was horrified to find me in be
d in my designer nightgown, Béla feeding me bites of fresh papaya.

  “Mother!” she cried. I was disgusting to her in that moment—froufrou, dependent. I’d offended her sensibilities of what it means to be a woman of strength.

  What she didn’t see was the choice I’d made, to honor and embrace my husband’s delight in caring for me. He lived for Saturdays when he’d get up early and drive across the border to the produce market in Juarez and search for the ripest red papayas that I loved. It brought him joy. And it brought me joy, too, to share in the sensory ritual, to receive what he longed to give.

  When you’re free, you take responsibility for being who you really are. You recognize the coping mechanisms or behavior patterns you’ve adopted in the past to get your needs met. You reconnect with the parts of yourself you had to give up, and reclaim the whole person you weren’t allowed to be. You break the habit of abandoning yourself.

  Remember: you have something no one else will ever have. You have you. For a lifetime.

  That’s why I talk to myself all the time. I say, “Edie, you’re one of a kind. You’re beautiful. May you be more and more Edie every day.”

  I am no longer in the habit of denying myself, emotionally or physically. I’m proud to be a high-maintenance woman! My wellness regimen includes acupuncture and massage. I do regular beauty treatments that aren’t necessary but feel good. I have facials. I get my hair painted—not just dyed one color, but three, from dark to light. I go to the department store makeup counter and experiment with new ways of doing my eyes. If I hadn’t learned to develop inner self-regard, no amount of pampering on the outside could change the way I feel about myself. But now that I hold myself in high esteem, now that I love myself, I know that taking care of myself on the inside can include taking care of myself on the outside, too—treating myself to nice things without suffering guilt, letting my appearance be an avenue for self-expression. And I’ve learned to accept a compliment. When someone says, “I like your scarf,” I say, “Thank you. I like it, too.”

  I’ll never forget the day I took teenage Marianne clothes shopping and she tried on an outfit I’d picked out for her and said, “Mom, it’s not me.” Her comment startled me. I worried I had raised her to be picky or even ungrateful. But then I realized what a gift it is to have children who know their own minds, who know what is “me” and what is “not me.”

  Honey, find you and keep filling it up with more you. You don’t have to work to be loved. You just have to be you. May you be more and more you every day.

  KEYS TO FREE YOURSELF FROM SELF-NEGLECT

  Anything we practice, we become better at. Spend at least five minutes every day savoring pleasant sensations: the first sip of coffee in the morning, the feel of warm sun on your skin or a hug from someone you love, the sound of laughter or rain on the roof, the smell of baking bread. Take time to notice and experience joy.

  Work, love, play. Make a chart that shows your waking hours each day of the week. Label the time you spend every day working, loving, and playing. (Some activities might fit in more than one category; if so, use all the labels that apply.) Then add up the total hours you spend working, loving, and playing in a typical week. Are the three categories roughly in balance? How could you structure your days differently so you do more of whatever is currently receiving the least of your time?

  Show yourself some love. Reflect on a time within the last week when someone demanded something of you or asked you for a favor. How did you respond? Was your response out of habit? Necessity? Desire? How did your response feel in your body? Was your response good for you? Now reflect on a time within the last week when you asked—or wanted to ask—someone for help. What did you say? How did it work out? Was your response good for you? What can you do today to be self-ish—to show yourself love and care?

  Chapter 4 ONE BUTT, TWO CHAIRS

  The Prison of Secrets

  In Hungary we have an expression: If you sit with one butt on two chairs, you become half-assed.

  If you’re living a double life, it’s going to catch up with you.

  When you’re free, you’re able to live with authenticity, to stop straddling the gap between two chairs—your ideal self and your real self—and become congruent. You learn to sit fully in the chair of your own fulfillment.

  Robin was struggling in the gap between two chairs when she came to see me, her marriage on the brink of collapse. She’d grown exhausted trying to live up to her husband’s exacting demands, and their marriage had become passionless and empty. She felt she needed an oxygen mask just to get through the day. In search of relief and joy, she began an affair.

  Cheating is a dangerous game. Nothing is more exciting than a new lover. When you’re in a new bed, you’re not talking about who’s going to take out the garbage, whose turn it is to drive the carpool to soccer practice. It’s all pleasure, no responsibility. And it’s temporary. For a while after the affair began, Robin had felt alive to joy, more optimistic, more nourished, able to tolerate the status quo at home because her hunger for affection and intimacy was being fed elsewhere. But then her lover gave her an ultimatum. She had to choose: her husband, or him.

  She booked her first session with me because she was stuck, unable to make up her mind. At her first appointment, she went around and around, detailing the pros and cons of two seemingly impossible choices. While a divorce would keep her lover from leaving, it would devastate her two children. But if she stayed in the marriage, she’d have to give up the one person who made her feel seen and cherished. It was either her kids’ happiness or her own fulfillment.

  But the fundamental choice she needed to make wasn’t about which man to be with. Whatever she was doing with her husband—withdrawing, hiding, keeping secrets—she would continue to do with the lover, or in any romantic relationship, until she chose to change. Her freedom wasn’t about choosing the right man. It was about finding a way to express her desires, hopes, and fears in any relationship.

  Sadly, this is a common problem. Even a marriage begun with passion and connection can grow to feel like a prison cell. It happens slowly over time, and it’s often difficult to see when and how the bars are built. There are the usual intrusions—stress over money or work or children or extended family or illness—and because the couple lacks the time or the tools to resolve these irritations, the worry and hurt and anger build up. After a while it’s even harder to express these feelings, because they lead to tension or arguments, and so it’s preferable to avoid the topics altogether. Before two people know it, they’re living separate lives. The door is open for someone else to come in and attempt to fill what’s been lost.

  When a relationship is strained, it’s not one person’s fault. Both people are doing things to maintain the distance and disputes. Robin’s husband was a perfectionist. He criticized her and was judgmental and hard to please. At first, it was tough for her to recognize that she was also doing things to damage the relationship: pulling away, going to another room, disengaging, disappearing. Most of all, keeping her unhappiness a secret. The affair was a secondary secret. The primary secret was all that she had begun habitually concealing from her husband—her daily ups and downs, sorrows and pleasures, longing and grief.

  Honesty starts with learning to tell the truth to yourself.

  I told Robin I would keep treating her if she liked, but only if she put the affair on hold as she worked to be in a more honest relationship with herself.

  I gave her two exercises. The first I call Vital Signs. It’s a quick way of taking your own temperature, becoming aware of your inner climate and the emotional weather you’re putting into the world. We’re always communicating, even when we’re not saying a word. The only time we don’t communicate is when we’re in a coma. Several times a day, make a conscious effort to check in with your body, to ask yourself, “Do I feel soft and warm, or cold and stiff?”

  Robin didn’t like discovering how often she was stiff, rigid, closed off. Over time, th
e act of taking her emotional temperature helped her soften. This is when I introduced the second exercise, Pattern Interruption—a way to consciously replace a habitual response with something else. When Robin felt herself wanting to withdraw or withhold from her husband, she would make a conscious effort not to disappear. She’d soften her gaze and look at her husband with loving eyes—something she hadn’t done for a long time. One evening at the dinner table, she gently reached for his hand.

  It was a tiny step toward intimacy. They still had a lot of repairs to make if they were to rebuild their relationship. But they’d begun.

  Healing can’t happen as long as we’re hiding or disowning parts of ourselves. The things we silence or cover up become like hostages in the basement, trying more and more desperately to get our attention.

  I know because I tried to hide my past for years, to conceal what had happened to me, to hide my grief and rage. When Béla and I fled Communist Europe after the war and came to America with Marianne, I wanted to be normal. I didn’t want to be the shipwrecked person I was, a mother who was also a Holocaust survivor. I worked in a garment factory, cutting loose threads off the seams of little boys’ underwear, paid seven cents per dozen, too scared to say anything in English for fear others would hear my accent. I just wanted to fit in, to be accepted. I didn’t want people to feel sorry for me. I didn’t want my scars to show.

  It wasn’t until decades later, when I was finishing my training as a clinical psychologist, that I realized the cost of my double life. I was trying to heal others without healing myself. I was an impostor. On the outside, I was a doctor. On the inside, a terrified sixteen-year-old was quaking, cloaked in denial, overachievement, and perfectionism.