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right, you have to do it yourself,\u201d more originality.\u00a0 Maybe they just offer \u201cconstructive criticism\u201d or offer to help you change to make yourself happier, by mentioning something over and over again. \u201cYou shouldn\u2019t have dessert my dear, you look like you\u2019ve put on a little weight,\u201d they tell you so innocently. \u201cNext time we\u2019ll do it your way, this time let\u2019s do it right,\u201d all mantras of their type. Then there\u2019s the \u201cworst case scenario,\u201d a fear mongers way of controlling your every word. Yep, you can hear them by their language, see them by their actions, and sense them by their demeanor. They are the CONTROL FREAKS!!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\nWe have let them in our neighborhoods as they riddle our masses with their controlling ideas. We have let them in our organizations<\/a> as they wreak havoc on the boardroom and make a fun group into a high school student government arguing about Robert\u2019s Rules of Order. And, many of us, have let them in our home as they work to criticize our every attempt at reaching our own conclusions by controlling our brains<\/a>. The \u201ccontrol freak\u201d knows no boundaries on letting loose emotions so that we want to just shut them up anyway we can. They make us desperate for air as they waterboard our sensibilities, our preference for logic and reason.\u00a0 We either step in line with their desires or suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous criticism, threats and become bumbling idiots in their micromanaged world. Fear the control freak, but understand you must treat them as an active shooter in your place of work. Let me explain that one\u2026.<\/span><\/p>\n There are some that are just perfectionists. Of course, no one reaches perfection outside themselves, but So, does that change the idea that they exist to make you miserable? Hardly. But it does change the idea that in some way you are going to change the control freak\u2019s behavior. You can only change their perception. Control freaks have one thing in common, they are uncomfortable with a lack of control. They have a strong desire to make decisions and keep their life under their own controls and if that means controlling through negatives, they will do that. So, whether you are working with a control freak, are a control freak, or know a control freak, the key is making them perceive that their life is under control even when they are driving you crazy. Fortunately police psychology has an answer for you!<\/span><\/p>\n I worked with a female patient who came in saying her boss was a real control freak and was driving the entire office crazy. Everyone was handling him by rebelling and she said she even was joining the resistance.\u00a0 She was going to stage a coup soon, a total office upheaval. They had gone over his head and that got them nowhere except a \u201clearn to get along with him or I will transfer you out,\u201d from her boss\u2019 boss. They had talked to him and that got them nowhere; they even tried joking him out of it and she said he clamped down even more. He would also make snide remarks about people behind their backs and that just drove the office crazy. She had all kinds of theories as to why he was the way he was, which all amounted to nothing. I told her to try an experiment and comment about how you admire that \u201che has everything under control in his life.\u201d His first response to her was \u201cI feel like my life is totally out of control, people don\u2019t like me, no one makes a decision, and my boss is on me all the time about overtime.\u201d We kept the comments up about him being in control, and how everything was running smoothly, and she even asked about how he made decisions so well. He responded by letting her be independent with her decisions and letting loose his being a control freak with her. He was still a total jerk to everyone else, but her he treated differently. She even got permission for overtime more frequently. I\u2019ve since redone this experiment with other patients many times with the same result.<\/span><\/p>\nThe Many Colors of the Control Freak<\/h2>\n
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they try. They want everything done to the minutest detail. And done the way they had envisioned it being done, of course, since no one can read their mind, no one has a way of telling what they are thinking. Sometimes they avoid that by giving their opinion of what you should do upfront. Sometimes they lie in wait to criticize the first sign it is going bad and would rather have to rescue the project or let it fail so they can prove they were right. Sometimes the control freak is an insecure person, sometimes a bully or a mean girl grown up, sometimes a narcissist, sometimes an attention seeker, and sometimes the product of a home in disarray from alcohol or divorce or inadequate parents. \u201cControl freakism\u201d ( I made that up, don\u2019t google) is a symptom of a problem, not the problem.<\/span><\/p>\nExperiment with What May Work<\/h2>\n
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Three Simple Steps of Dealing with a Control Freak<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n