When I look back at my personal development through to my adulthood, when it came to team sports such as basketball, hockey, tennis-doubles and even volleyball, one of the fundamentals was to learn to catch the ball, or learn to tackle to obtain the ball, or learn to cleverly pass the ball. Such lessons learned showed that you are a team-player and good sportsmanship. As a result, I would take these lessons into every sphere of relationships, either personal or professional. That means, unconsciously I grew up with the inept sense of wanting and needing to catch ‘balls’ either of an emotional or psychological nature in both platonic and romantic relationships. This realization came about after my Aunt who resides in the USA came for a 4-week visit to Harare this Christmas holiday to have her traditional and white wedding, of which I had the honor of being her maid-of-honor. After witnessing a few family dynamics between me and family members she said to me one day,‘Tambu, you need to learn not to catch balls. People are constantly, presenting balls in front of you but that doesn’t mean you must pick them up and run with them.’ Speaking metaphorically, is how my Aunt communicates, in fact, it is a Shona way of communicating sometimes controversial or uncomfortable topics. Therefore, I understood the context in which my Aunt was referring to, in addition, she provided examples about me being in the ball-catcher mode. In laymens terms, the metaphor means that when people come with a problem it is not necessarily yours to do anything about it. Learn not to participate. You will find that they were not necessarily seeking a solution to it but wanted to pass on the problem to you so that you are accountable and responsible for seeing it through even though it is their emotional-luggage to carry. I reflected on this insight and began to see how eventually I found myself in the middle of drama, hook, line and sinker around family members and/or colleagues who are the ball-carriers and ball-throwers and these are the 5 key lessons I learned how not to catch other people’s balls (in no particular order of importance):
1) Listen but neither nurse the grievance nor act to resolve it – This is when someone presents their dilemma in a way that is theatrical and entertaining to get both your emotional and psychological attention. This happens when the person (without your awareness or knowledge) has been rallying for support for their grievance against their ‘enemy’ and only seeks to win your favor in ganging up against their ‘enemy.’ Before you know it, you are not only part of the problem, you now have adopted the victim’s enemy as your own. So not only, are you in a warzone at night but you are neither qualified, equipped, prepared and lack deep insight into the problem to fully win the ‘battle.’ Hence, the wise saying: ‘choose your battles wisely,’ speaks insurmountable truths! You have just caught a very huge ball for yourself.
2) Understand the Environment – In business one is always taught to conduct a market and environmental analysis before entering. This is because if one decides to implement a business plan prior to doing proper research they will find the life of their business will be short-lived and penniless. Therefore, when entering a community-dynamic that you are unfamiliar with, especially if you are like me who has lived abroad mostly for approximately 10 years and you come back home assuming that community-dynamics have remained unchanged you are mistaken. For example, I had a young woman come to me with some family problems. This young woman happened to be the sister of my aunt’s (my mother’s sister-in-law’s) close friend. In short, I naively counseled her using examples from the dynamics of my family (as I have always done in my life) and in turn takes that information and twists it in a manner that leaves her older sister (close friend to aunt) needing to make a ‘ball’ out of it and pass it on to my aunt. The irony is, at the first knowledge of my aunt receiving this information she neither confronted me nor seeked to understand my version of the story. Hence, my aunt also contributed to building the ball from a ‘hockey-sized-ball’ to ‘basketball.’ In essence, by the time my aunt received her friend’s numerous earful versions of my counseling sessions to the young woman she was now passing on the ball that her friend had created, and adding to its formation by choosing to participate in support of the close friend’s grievance instead of choosing not to be involved in the 26 year old’s issues and instead seek to warn me as her niece and not reprimand me as an enemy of the state for choosing to act like a good Samaritan to a disguised damsel-in-distress.
Warning note: Beware of emotional vampires in an environment you are still trying to understand. This leads us to point number 3.
3) ‘You have the right to remain silent’ – Have you ever watched Law n’ Order TV series or any American detective series. When they initially arrest someone, the first thing the police say to the arrested civilian is ‘You have the right to remain silent, anything you do or say will be used against you in the court of law…’ The court of law in this case is the community you choose to live in. They are judges and the prosecutors who decide whether you are a vocal threat or not to their community. Much like my naivety in point 2. Stick to not offering any advice no matter, how good natured, loving and friendly person you are. Instead, say absolutely nothing until you understand the community-dynamics and the role you effectively play in it.
4) Learn to be your own personal leader – There is a saying that says that one is either a leader or a follower. I am here to say that it is not that black n’white. In fact, one needs to learn to be both. This is because the emotional vampire is an autocratic leader. That means, they always seek to have followers promote and endorse their grievance in their absence. This is done but planting seeds of doubt in the minds of the people they grieve to, about their target. This psychological game is designed to turn one into an unwitting, loyal follower of causes, to which you seek not to be part of. If you don’t have one already, develop a moral compass where you do not allow your values to be compromised. This inevitably can be a lonely journey especially if the community-dynamics has adopted a culture of autocratic and rigid conformity.
Warning signs: They are always bearers of bad news; always full of excuses/long stories of why they don’t have your corner when you need them; it’s a relationship based on ‘if you cratch my back, I will cratch yours’ philosophy.
5) Keep a poker face – The ball-carriers n’throwers are like vampires on a hunt for fresh blood. Any signs of willingness to catch the ball and run with it will be to their advantage. Develop an expressionless face even with your family members that you have known all your life. This will help you a long way in becoming on the ‘useless’ list of ball-catchers. Trust me, it is a good thing to be on this list. For example, I had an X person who insisted on playing the ‘I will report to your mom’ card because I did not play into her manipulative games that truly worked on reducing my rights to privacy and freedom as an unmarried woman. So, instead, she will work to build cases to the ‘high court’ (i.e. my mother and esteemed elders of the family) in the hopes of reverting me to her mercy. That approach backfired, when the ‘high court’ refused to catch any of the balls she was throwing and instead sent her packing back where she initially caught them.
Warning signs: a serial ball carrier n’ thrower; creates drama to draw attention away from their own roles that required them to perform.
Posted on blogspot on 8 January 2012 by Tambu Ndoro, CEO/Founder of Ndoro Resources (Pvt) Ltd t/a Hanga Consulting Services 2011.
