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APRIL 2005 -------
Birth Order is personality developed in early childhood coping with family. Dear Birth Order Plus subscriber, Interest in Birth Order usually indicates a desire to improve relationships with a partner, friends, associates and family. Knowing Birth Order can put new life into a relationship that has gone stale. A relationship is built on encounters that either build the relationship or tear it down. These encounters have six elements to them - contact, greeting, interaction, relating, playing and closeness. You go through some or all of these steps every time you encounter a person with whom you have a relationship. The encounter begins with contact. Two people get an impression of each other with a glance. If the encounter is by phone they get their impression by hearing how the other person sounds. This first impression sets the tone for the encounter. Just looking at each other can improve a relationship. The next step in the relationship is greeting. Greeting says "I like you." If you want to convey dislike just refuse to return a greeting. A good greeting moves the relationship along. The third phase of relating is interaction. During this phase you learn about each other by finding out how each is feeling, thinking, experiencing life, wanting, expecting, hoping and needing. This understanding sets the groundwork for the rest of the encounter. People fail in this phase most frequently. It is the area in which understanding Birth Order is most significant. Knowing Birth Order increases awareness. The fourth step is actually relating, defined as doing things together. What you do together, how you do it and whether you do it is determined by the interaction that oriented you to each other. This is the area in which we spend the vast majority of our time. Play is the fifth step. As you are doing things together something will strike you as humorous. You make a comment, crack a joke, poke fun, tease, act out as your partner does the same. You laugh together. You are playing with each other and it's fun. You are developing closeness with each other. The goal of all this is closeness, the sixth step. If the encounter has gone well, you are feeling close to each other. As it ends, you look forward to the next time you encounter each other. Birth Order can help or hinder in the third step, interacting. Birth Order hinders if you are simply acting out your Birth Order but helps if it enables understanding of yourself and the other. It hinders a relationship if it keeps you from being yourself. As an Only, wanting to be right can hinder your relationships. It makes you be careful about how you interact so you don't do something wrong. To overcome this, never get so interested in being right that you forget yourself. As a First Born, wanting to impress others gets in the way. By impressing you are trying to get the other to see you in a particular way. To overcome this never get so interested in impressing that you forget yourself. If you're a Second your sensitivity can get in the way. You try to avoid getting hurt so you suppress your feelings with thinking. Feelings suppressed under pressure become powerful, overwhelming and irresistible. They come out at unwanted times to damage your relationships. Never get so interested in feeling that you forget yourself. If you're a Third your wanting to be strong gets in the way. You hide your weaknesses, make fun of them or simply focus on the other person so that you do not put yourself in the encounter. You put distance between yourself and the other person. Never get so interested in being strong that you forget yourself. If you're a Fourth your analyzing gets in the way. You're not fighting your feelings, you're just ignoring them. You don't connect emotionally because you are relying entirely on thinking to relate. So, never get so interested in thinking that you forget yourself. A good encounter conveys a positive message at each step:
Looking - I notice you. Because so much of an encounter depends on understanding each other in the interaction phase, knowing Birth Order helps. It's not a substitute for learning from each other but a jump-start. "The Birth Order Effect" and "The Birth Order Effect for Couples" books are excellent resources. Counseling Birth Order based counseling/consulting is available by telephone. If you are interested send an email to cliff@birthorderplus.com or call 1-800-214-0795.
Cliff Isaacson, BA, BD Web site: www.birthorderplus.com To sign up for the Birth Order Newsletter go to http://www.birthorderplus.com/newsletter/menu.htm. Check out the archive of past newsletters. The following books by Cliff are available by email or 1-800-214-0795:
The Birth Order Challenge Hardback $19.95 Credit Card payments are accepted.
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