Circles of Control as a Life Skill

One of my favorite tools to use with my clients is the "Circles on Control" tool. Together, we map out which components of a particular challenge that she can control and those that are out of her control. In my opinion, the Circles of control can be applied to almost any situation -- friend struggles, general anxiety, overwhelm about school work and so on. The Circles really allow the client to focus their attention on what they can control. It provides visual validation that some things are out of their control while demonstrating that they have the ability to manipulate and manage many other parts of that particular situation. In essence, this simple tool can transform their sense of anxiety or overwhelm to a feeling of capability and calmness.

Recently, my client, Charlotte (all names have been changed to protect privacy), was struggling with a friend who would intermittently seem quiet and upset. Charlotte, like most tween and teen girls, would worry that she had done something wrong and that her friend was upset with her. As we worked through the Circles, Charlotte determined that she could not control whether her friend was upset and wanted to be alone. What Charlotte could control was that she checked on her friend to make sure she was okay and then she could decide whether she wanted to follow her friend when she walked away from the group or stay with the group that she enjoyed spending time with. As I continued to meet with Charlotte, she could easily tell me that her friend was quiet that day, but she knew she had been a good friend and that she was unlikely the reason her friend was upset. Ultimately, her friend disclosed that Charlotte was not the reason she would want be alone at times and that she appreciated Charlotte's friendship. This one exercise allowed Charlotte to stop spending the school days worried about something that was in no way her fault.

Over the last two years, I've been reading about Buddhist philosophy and have been trying to incorporate some of the teachings and practices into my daily life. One of the Foundations of Buddhist philosophy is that primary suffering can not be avoided. Examples of primary suffering are physical pain, the loss of a loved one, financial strain or even being cut off in traffic. It is our reaction to the cause of the primary suffering that results in secondary or ongoing suffering.

One of my frequent daily annoyances involves a one lane underpass where cars are supposed to stop and honk their horn and listen for another car to respond before proceeding through the tunnel. On many occasions, I will honk, hear nothing and proceed only to be greeted by another car partway through or be halfway through the underpass and have another car come into the tunnel without honking. I'm not going to lie, there was a time where I would FUME when this happened. What do you think caused more suffering -- having to back out and let the other car pass or fuming about it for the next 20 minutes? In no way could I have controlled what that other car did, but I can certainly decide to not let that minor suffering ruin an otherwise perfectly pleasant morning. Like the Circles of control, we need to focus on what we can and cannot control.

Now, let's talk about Mel Robbins' new book "The Let Them Theory", which I cannot recommend enough. Essentially (in my very simplified takeaway), Mel discusses that we cannot control what other people think or how they behave, so we should just "Let Them" think or act the way they are going to. The next step of this theory, is we then get to "Let ourselves" decide how we will respond (or not) and behave. Humans are obviously much more complicated than this simple breakdown, so the book goes into the science and specifics on various relationships, situations, etc that we will encounter in our lifetime. I am sure I will revisit this book many more times in the future.

I absolutely love the way these philosophies overlap with each other and how relatively easy they are to incorporate into your daily life. And the best part is that they WORK! By providing my clients with the skill of organizing challenges into "Circles of Control", I am instilling tools that they will use for life.