Summary of Dragon Slaying Part2 by L. Michael Hall
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The Whiny Victim Dragon
We cannot live vigorously or fully if we avoid danger and risks. Bounce back power is easy when you know nothing can question your dignity and worth. No event or evaluation will define you. You are not your behaviors or labels.
A pessimistic explanatory style in response to some bad thing can keep you a prisoner of this dragon.
Having a direction or purpose provides a powerful organizing principle. Who do you want to become? What experiences do you want to have? What achievements you want to accomplish? What are your compelling values and visions?
Acting from a larger perspective allows us to know what's going on and where we are in the process.
Reactivity and Defensiveness Dragon
This is the result of representing something as threatening or overwhelming. Stress is the amount of energy you expend coping with life. The most useful tool for dealing with defensiveness therefore is NLP Reframing.
You can choose to respond to something proactively with a sense of choice and personal power, by:
- Noticing the gap between stimulus and response - and stepping back
- Truly recognizing that you are generating your own states, the other is not causing them.
- Focusing on the things you can do
- Using proactive language, like "I" statements rather than blaming, accusing "you" statements. Ditch the excuses.
- Having strong compelling outcomes
- Taking care of things while they are still small and manageable
Criticism and Insult
Very few people can make good use of criticism. Criticisms hurt because they make you aware of your shortcomings.
- Internal sense of distance
- Discern the line between responsibility to and responsibility for.
- Meta State of high self-esteem
- Optimistic explanatory style
- The inside reality of language - words and meanings that provoke
Dismiss criticism only after you have purged it of everything useful.
Magnanimity (try saying that before breakfast)
This is the ability to transcend frustration, and find gentle reasonableness and bighearted thoughts.
When things don't go the way we want, we need to step back and edit the big picture, changing submodalities such as association dissociation. We can adjust our expectations to make them realistic, being sure to distinguish between desires and demands.
Accepting what is is a big part of magnanimity. Non-acceptance leads to intolerance. This doesn't mean you have to like or want it or not take steps to change it.
Things not going the way we want. Accepting frees us to focus on solutions, but more importantly helps us develop better maps.
We tolerate our intolerance too much.
Forgiveness
A useful strategy to achieve forgiveness is to rage against the hurt, but respect and feel compassion for the person. Hurtful behaviors violate everyone.
The hurt does not rob you of your dignity. You do not have to tolerate the behavior, but your can make a decision to let go of the hurt.
