Ep #368: The Purpose of Defensiveness

Hello empowered principals. Welcome to episode 368. 

Welcome to The Empowered Principal® Podcast, a not so typical educational resource that will teach you how to gain control of your career and get emotionally fit to lead your school and your life with joy by refining your most powerful tool, your mind. Here’s your host certified life coach Angela Kelly Robeck. 

Well hello, my empowered principals. How are you doing? Welcome back to school. Here we are. Let’s go. Are you in EPC? Why not? I miss you. Come let’s go. It’s the best time we’re having the best time. I want you to be a part of the party. We are killing it this year. We’re doing so much. It’s just fun. I can’t even tell you. It’s my favorite day of the week. It’s my favorite time of the day. I love EPC so, so much. I love these people. I love their brains, their empowerment. It lights me up with so much energy and excitement. I can’t tell you.

I feel there’s a new wave coming into education. We are going to mainstream life and leadership coaching for school leaders. I can feel it. It feels good to feel good. This is what I want for you. I want us to drop down the stress, turn down the volume of the stress and the anxiety and the pressure and the negativity and the toxicity and we’re going to turn up transformation. We’re going to turn up empowerment, evolution, feeling good about yourself, your staff, your students, your school, taking that pressure down, turning up the empowerment, having some fun, laughing a little bit, enjoying your job again, not taking things so seriously, not letting everybody else’s opinion crush you, and turning up the volume on how you feel about you.

And that’s what we’re going to talk about today. I want to talk about the purpose of defensiveness. If you’re listening and you’re not driving or walking, you’re sitting down, I want you to just tune into yourself for a second and ask yourself when you feel defensive, when somebody says something to you and you’re like and your urge is to react in defensiveness, I want you just to pause and think about what that feels like.

I know for me, like I’m doing it right now as I speak to you. And when someone says something to me and I feel that urge to say something right back out of defensiveness, there is a term in therapy and it’s called JADE. JADE. J-A-D-E. It stands for justify, argue, defend, explain. When you feel like you want to jade somebody, you want to justify it, your actions or your decisions, you want to argue back with them, you want to defend yourself and explain, here’s what’s going on, here’s why, this is what I did, da-da-da-da, right? You don’t want them to be upset or they said something to you and you want to fire back at them, it triggers you into fight or flight.

Defensiveness for me really puts me in fight or flight and I will fight. I’m an attacker. I am very good with words. Somebody comes at me, I will want to justify and explain and defend myself, I don’t want to feel like I’m put into a corner or that somebody is presuming to know what I’m thinking, how I’m feeling, why I made my decisions. I will want to get right up in there and pepper them with information or question. This isn’t the best approach. It doesn’t work. I want a more refined approach. I want to have more charisma, compassion, a softness in my approach.

My masculine energy tends to rush in whenever I feel the need to defend myself. Whenever I feel that somebody has said something that puts me on the defense, I will go in to fight. Some people shut down. When somebody says something that’s offensive to them, they might just go into flight mode or, you know, freeze. They just shut right down or they get out of there as soon as possible. Or they fawn, which is they placate you, they kiss up because they don’t want the conflict. All of those are fight or flight responses.

So when you are in the feeling of defensive, I want us to talk about the purpose of it. Defensiveness doesn’t just show up at your door and you’re just, for no reason, you feel offended or for no reason you feel defensive and the need to justify yourself, the need to jade.

I was coaching a client on this and I asked her, I said it sounds to me like when the teacher said that you were being nitpicky, so we were talking about observations, the teacher was like, “Oh, she’s so nitpicky with her observation feedback.” And my client was like, ugh, that feels a little crunchy for me. That doesn’t feel good. I don’t like that.

And the client went into a story about why she was being nitpicky or was, then she started questioning, was she being nitpicky? And I want you to notice something. When somebody says something to you and your gut reaction before anything else is to defend yourself, you feel offended, you wanna defend yourself, pause, first of all, take a breath. But I want you to really stop and think about why we feel defensive.

Let’s say somebody says to you, “You’re very nitpicky in your observations.” And you’re like, “No, I’m not. I have 25 years experience. I know what I’m talking about.” Or “Am I? Am I that nitpicky? I don’t think that I am too nitpicky. Am I too nitpicky? Maybe I am too nitpicky.” Or “No, it’s my job. I’m your boss. I’m not being nitpicky. I’m just telling you what’s right, okay?” So you either get on board or you don’t. Or you justify it with, “well, according to the standards, according to the teaching professional standards, this is what we have to do, right?”

We want to get in there and protect ourselves from being attacked, okay? But the purpose of defensiveness, when you unpeel the layers, defensiveness is a mask. It’s a guard. It’s an armor. You go into fight or flight when you feel offended. Like, hey, that’s not right. You’re wrong about me. That’s not cool. Why do you say that? That doesn’t feel good. It’s like, oh, emotionally, I’m being attacked. This doesn’t feel good to me. The defensiveness is an armor trying to protect you.

So when you’re defensive, when you’re feeling defensive and you’re feeling offended, notice that you have an urge to protect. But I want to ask you what you’re protecting yourself from. When you think about somebody who says something to you and you find it offensive, or you find it attacking, and you feel the need to go on the defense, what’s really happening is that it’s trying to mask another emotion. So frustration is the surface level emotion. And then below the surface is another emotion that you don’t want to feel.

So you don’t want them to be right because that might mean, oh I feel incompetent, incapable, insufficient, I’m not doing this right, I don’t have the skill set. Then we get into identity issues. And most of the feelings that we feel really are an identity issue at the very end of the day. I will just tell you that. That is why we do so much work in EPC about identity.

And when you lack confidence or you feel like imposter syndrome where you’re like, everyone’s going to find out someday that I’m actually not really good or I don’t really know what I’m doing. I’m just faking it till I make it for the rest of my life. Right?

When we don’t feel like we have leadership skills, we doubt ourselves, we doubt our decisions, or we question what we should do, we feel very antsy about something. Usually what happens is we go from one end of the pendulum to the other, where you might come in super sweet, super nice. You just want everybody to like you. You’re a brand new leader. And you get a year of that, right? Because everybody’s given you a year to fill you out.

But they don’t want nice. They don’t want a friend. They want a boss. They want a leader. They want someone who has structure. So you start with being too nice, too gooey sweet, there’s no systems, there’s no boundaries. It’s just like with kids, right? With no structure, no boundaries, no sets of standards, don’t hold anybody accountable for anything because you don’t want anybody to be upset or offended or hurt.

Over there, when you’re on that side of town, on that side of the fence, you get people talking about you that, like, she doesn’t have any boundaries, she doesn’t hold anybody accountable. So the people who are doing their job aren’t happy with you because you’re not holding everybody equally accountable. And the people who are loving this approach, they are loving the approach because they’re getting away with something or they aren’t being asked to be at their highest level. They’re like, “Oh, this feels comfortable. This was easy. This was good. I like her. She’s nice.”

Well, you’re nice until you get feedback and they’re like, well, you need to talk to this teacher and we need to get third grade scores up and fourth grade math doesn’t look that great. Or if you’re in middle or high school, this department’s not working well together. You’ve got to come in and work with them.

Now all of a sudden, you feel like you don’t have any authority because you’ve been their friend. Just like parenting, or it’s just like teaching. Too, too nice doesn’t get results. But what happens is, in reaction to that, we swing to the other side, or we come in hot. Now we’re gonna be strict or we’re gonna follow the standards and everybody’s gonna be held accountable.

And when we do that big swing, people are like, what’s going on? And you’re like, well over here I was being so nice because I didn’t want to have to get defensive. I didn’t want to have to be feel offended at all. So I’m just gonna be super nice. Or over here, I’m going to be really firm, really strict. And now I’ve got to come down hard. Right.

And when you think about what that looks and feels like, it means like I’ve got to be more direct. I’ve got to be more consistent. I’ve got to have clear communication. I’ve got to write people up. And that feels very hard.

Notice, like, what feels hard? What feels easy? And when teachers are giving you feedback, where do you feel yourself feeling resistant or defensive or offended. What’s happening within that is there’s a little bit of part of that feedback that doesn’t feel good to you. Why? Because you believe it too.

When someone says to you like, “Man, you seem really discombobulated this week. Are you okay?” And you’re scrambling all over and you’re thinking, “Yeah, I am such a hot mess.” And you’re like, “No, I’m fine. I’m just really busy this week. Sorry.” And then you walk away and you sink down. You’re like, yeah, because I am a hot mess. I don’t have my calendar under control. I haven’t planned. I don’t have time for anything. I’m putting out fires. I’m a big mess.

Somebody’s gonna find out that I don’t know what I’m doing and then I’ll be exposed and then I’ll get fired. Right? We go to these extremes. But I want you to notice when feedback feels offensive and the purpose of defensiveness is that it’s trying to let you know, hey, there’s a part of you that believes this too, and that feels too painful to acknowledge, so we just attack back, or we just avoid it. We go into fight or flight, we attack or we avoid. We shut down or we just turn away, we dismiss it, we avoid it at all costs.

So go below the surface of defensiveness. Defensiveness is there as an invitation to introspect, to sit down and to say, why am I so defensive right now? What about this comment did not feel good to me? Is it because it’s wrong? What they said was not accurate and I want to tell them otherwise? In that case, we have to learn how to expand our capacity to let people be wrong about us because they can’t possibly know us. They can’t possibly know everything about us. They can’t know every detail that you know when you made that decision. So we have to allow people to be wrong without being defensive all the time.

So is what they said inaccurate and that’s why you feel defensive? Is what they said painful because maybe I believe it’s true and that doesn’t feel good? But we want to explore is that you’re believing it’s true, they’re saying it’s true, they’re really just mirroring to you what you believe about yourself, but is it actually true? Are you really a hot mess? Or was it just an exceptionally wild week?

Do you actually know how to sit down and plan? Of course you do. You wouldn’t be in education if you didn’t know how to plan and prepare and be ready and have a schedule and follow a calendar. You wouldn’t have made it this far. So I know you have the skill. Then it comes down to why am I not getting to it? Or what seems to be feeling off this week? Or maybe I feel off every week. Why is that?

And defensiveness is simply an invitation to ask ourself, why am I feeling defensive? What aspect of this? Get very specific with yourself. Why am I feeling defensive? Is it because it’s wrong?

And I wanted to correct this. Is there a misunderstanding? Is it because I believe it’s true and I’m offended, but deep inside I feel like embarrassed or intimidated or I’m self-doubting or I lack confidence or I’m afraid I don’t have the skill set and I don’t want people to know? Is it because it was rude, disrespectful, which are opinions, right?

When someone says, “Hey, did you gain weight? You look a little fuller than you did last time I saw you.” You might be like, that was totally rude. You’re going to be defensive. “No, I haven’t gained weight.” Or, “Yes, I have. So what’s it to you?” Do you see what I’m saying? Versus, are we willing to let people like, “Wow, that’s an interesting comment. Why did you make that comment?” Or, “That didn’t feel good for me.” Being honest with the feedback versus getting defensive about it.

So someone says something to you that feels offensive and rude, whether it’s true or not true, you might be feeling bad if you’ve gained weight or not, or maybe you haven’t gained weight, so you’re like, “No I haven’t,” and you want to defend. Or, “Yeah I have,” and I feel terrible inside and now you’ve just pointed it out making it feel worse. Versus keeping it neutral and being like, “Nope.” Or, “That’s an interesting comment,” just not responding one way or the other.

But notice, when you feel defensive, there’s something going on inside of you. Maybe it’s wrong and you feel the need to defend yourself and to correct them, and then you have to play that out, correcting them, what’s the outcome of that? Is it just for me to feel better, to feel justified? Or is it something they said that feels true for you, and if it does, we want to explore that.

Or if it’s something they did that, in your opinion, was out of line or disrespectful or rude, inappropriate, you want to be able to call it out, but not from defensiveness. You want to clean up any offensiveness in your body and say, when someone makes a comment like that, why did you feel offended? And get yourself to a neutral space so that you can say, “Hey, I didn’t appreciate the question.”

Or, “Hey, that really kind of stung when you said that,” or simply, “Why would you ask that?” Because then you’re just saying, here’s who I am genuinely. That hurt my feelings, or I’m feeling this way. Why would you say that? Or, “I just want to let you know that bothered me, and I’m curious to know why you asked it.” Do you see what happens? You’re not on the defense. You’re asking them and now they have to justify, explain, defend, argue their reasons. Now they’re on the hot seat for having said the thing. You see the difference?

Versus you lashing at them, you stay in neutral energy, take a breath, take a moment. If you have to take some time away, do that too. If somebody says something rude to you and you can’t quite process it in real time, that’s okay. You can go away, process it, and come back when you’re calm and ready. But flying off the handle and going into JADE mode, which is justify, argue, defend, explain, that usually doesn’t have a net positive outcome for you or for them or for the relationship.

Remember, it’s for us, for them, for the greater good. We want to make sure that our communications and our conversations aren’t held in defensiveness because now you’ve got two people who are both in fight-or-flight and that’s just gonna get into gridlock. Everyone wants to be right, everybody wants to feel better, and they think they need you to tell them they’re right or for you to say you’re sorry or for you to do something for them to feel better. Now we’ve got our steer cycles all mixed together.

We want to separate them back out, stay in our own lane, handle our own emotions first, check in with ourselves. Emotions are just an indicator that we need to check in with ourselves. What am I feeling and why? And then you’ll see there’s some probably emotions under the surface. That’s the purpose of defensiveness is to say, “Hey, hey, Angela, FYI, you’re feeling a little defensive right now. We need to tune in because there’s actually something going on below the surface here.” And then you can get to the heart of the matter and clarify for yourself why you’re feeling offended. Was it just out of alignment?

Was it they just didn’t know what was going on? Or they just don’t have privy to the information? You can let that go. Your teachers will never understand what it’s like to be a principal until they’re actually a principal.

It’s like having your own children. People who tell people how to parent without being a parent, you understand that, right? It’s like this person telling you how to do your job but they’ve never done it. It’s like, that’s interesting, but we get defensive about it.

Well, you don’t know how hard this is. You don’t know how busy I am. You don’t need to do that. They don’t understand it. They can’t understand it. You have to have perspective to see that they don’t have perspective.

So try this. See how it works. Let me know. Come on into EPC. I teach you this. I will walk you through it because there’s one thing to understand it intellectually to know the what. But the how is where it’s hard. It can feel hard. It’s emotionally hard. It’s mentally challenging, but you’re expanding and you’re growing and you’re transforming into the most beautiful empowered leader when you do this work.

Come on into EPC. I’ll see you there. Take good care. Have a great week. Bye.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Empowered Principal® Podcast. If you enjoyed this episode and want to learn more, please visit angelakellycoaching.com where you can sign up for weekly updates and learn more about the tools that will help you become an emotionally fit school leader.