Happy Monday.
Clickbaity headline, no?
Sometimes the simplest path to engagement is clarity.
Heard of ‘grey rocking?’. Me neither. I would have guessed it was a bus load of pensioners off to a country music festival.
This piece in the Washington Post caught my eye.
According to the article:
“Grey rocking is “a communication tool that involves being less engaged during an emotionally toxic interaction,” explained Brianne Markley, a psychologist at the Cleveland Clinic.
By responding to goading comments with a blank expression and calm, neutral tone — imagining you’re a dull grey rock, in other words — “you’re not adding fuel to an already volatile fire,” said Chloe Nazra Lee, a resident physician in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center in New York.
Though not a research-backed concept, the grey rock method has become something of a “pop psychology” phenomenon, as Lee put it. The term “grey rocking” was reportedly coined by a mental health blogger named Skylar in 2012, and it has lately exploded on social media platforms. There, creators discuss its merits as a strategy for dealing with difficult people.
The theory is that if you’re interacting with someone who is trying to manipulate or gaslight you, or has narcissistic personality disorder or displays narcissistic traits, they probably “want to get a rise out of you,” explained Julia Babcock, a clinical psychologist and professor at the University of Houston. “Even negative attention reinforces them, so you give them no reinforcement.” (This is different from stonewalling, when one person refuses to communicate at all, an approach that can damage relationships, Lee said.)”
It could be a reasonable strategy to “be a grey rock” when dealing with someone you interact with only occasionally, such as an annoying neighbor or co-worker, “but when there is a narcissist in your house, that’s different,” said Sandra Graham-Bermann, the director of the Child Resilience and Trauma Lab and a professor of psychology and psychiatry at the University of Michigan.
In situations where you don’t feel unsafe but do have to interact with a difficult person, the grey rock method is “just good advice on how you manage” them, Graham-Bermann said. “You don’t give extra attention; limit your engagement and protect yourself.”
Babcock said she sees grey rocking as potentially useful when navigating challenging co-parenting dynamics, such as if one parent is trying to goad the other. This has some similarities with a co-parenting approach called parallel parenting, which involves minimal, businesslike interactions with the other parent. Research has found that interparental conflict can affect the well-being of children of divorce, so limited communication between parents might prevent kids from being exposed to disagreements.
A disengagement approach such as grey rocking is not a way to get a romantic partner to behave differently or improve a relationship that’s soured, Babcock noted. “It’s not something you do in a relationship you want to maintain,” she said. “You do it in short bursts in relationships where you have no choice but to maintain contact with this person.”
So how do you do it?
Center yourself
Maybe you’re about to enter a situation with a person you suspect will try to provoke you. Beforehand, repeating a mantra might allow you to tap into that grey rock mindset, Babcock said. She recommended a sky and weather metaphor from psychotherapist and acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) trainer Russ Harris: “The observing self is like the sky, while thoughts, sensations and images are like the weather. The weather constantly changes throughout the day. And whatever it is, the sky always has room for it. No matter how bad the weather, no matter how violent the thunderstorm, no matter how severe the sun, the sky cannot be damaged in any way.”
Keep responses calm and neutral
Think: a flat affect, neutral tone of voice, limited eye contact and brief, disinterested replies. Hopefully, the other person will get the message that you’re not engaged in the conversation, Babcock said. “It is really not fun to talk with somebody who has that blank expression and doesn’t seem to be absorbing” what you’re saying, she said.
Know the technique probably won’t improve a person’s behavior
The grey rock method can be a short-term strategy in situations where you can’t avoid a difficult person and want to interact as little as possible. And while there’s always a chance that not reacting to their provocations might lead them to exert their efforts elsewhere, “it’s not about changing the other person’s behaviour,” Babcock noted. “It’s about making the interaction atypical and breaking that pattern.”
Give yourself grace
You certainly shouldn’t feel like you’ve failed if you can’t remain calm and neutral in these situations, experts said. “If someone is consistently needling at you, hitting your insecurities, deliberately trying to provoke a reaction, [grey rocking] can be really hard to do,” Lee said, “so I don’t fault anyone who gets emotional in that moment.” The technique can also take a toll on the person using it, Markley added: “Even though you don’t offer an emotional rise, it doesn’t mean you’re not feeling something.”
See you next Monday Morning,
Wade
I read this article - super interesting, thanks for your take