The cat's ass and the pitchfork

I love this analogy.

First off, I can't relate well to some cliches. "The straw that broke the camel's back," I can't relate to that. Haven't seen a camel outside of a zoo, and I can't imagine a straw heavy enough to break a camel's spine in two. (I know, too literal, but follow me on this.)

I haven't seen many camels, but I've seen a lot of cartoons. So, when I get a client who comes in and says, "I get angry over stupid stuff," I share this observation:

You've seen that cartoon where the cat has one foot on this chair, and the other foot all the way over on this other chair, and this cat's holding a stove, and a refrigerator, and a kitchen table, and an elephant, and a car, and all this other stuff stacked up to the ceiling? And you see this cat shaking, just ready to fall from the chair; underneath this cat's ass is a pitchfork or a shovel of hot coals.

Then there's usually this mouse on a nearby ladder, getting ready to drop a feather, and this feather is presumably that one-last-thing that will make this cat lose his shit.

That cat's you (the client). All that stuff the cat's holding, that's all that stuff that stresses you out on a daily basis: the kids, the family, the job, the neighbors, the boyfriend, the ex-husband (insert other stressors here). The feather that mouse is about to drop? That's all those "stupidest stuffs" that piss you off. That pitchfork? That's you, pissed off.

Now, it's not a question of stopping the mouse from dropping the feather; the feather isn't the problem. Nope, the problem is you thinking you can hold all that furniture and appliances by yourself, one leg over here, the other leg over there. You either drop the heaviest stuff, you build up your strength to hold up the heaviest stuff easier, you develop a way to keep the feather from making your load uncarryable. Or the other option ... you get accustomed to getting poked iin the ass over and over and over.

You'd be surprised at how this manages to make the most sense to even the most basic of folks. I used it in group today, and they seemed to love it.

(Next chapter around the end of the week.)