Life Is Too Short for Habitual Line-Steppers

[DISCLAIMER]

I have fond memories of repeatedly listening to rapper Too $hort’s album Life Is... Too $hort (1989) in both child- and adulthood. One of my favorite songs on the joint is “Life Is... Too $hort”, an existentialist track in which the rapper makes the following declarative statement:

Life is to some people unbearable

Commit suicide, and that’s terrible

Was it much too much or nothing big?

If you live my life, you’d be fightin’ to live

Life is to me my main asset

I be doin’ all right, and keep it just like that

In this statement, Too $hort uses what’s known in Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT) as self-disturbing beliefs. These unhelpful assumptions are what cause unpleasant consequences on a cognitive, emotive, sensory, and behavioral level. A brief demonstration may be useful.

REBT uses the ABC model to illustrate that when an undesirable Action occurs and you Believe an unhelpful narrative about the event, it’s your unfavorable assumption, not the occurrence itself, that causes an unpleasant Consequence. In essence, you upset yourself!

In particular, there are four predominate irrational beliefs which people often use in regard to self-disturbance: global evaluations, low frustration tolerance, awfulizing, and demandingness. When contemplating these unproductive personal philosophies, think of the acronym GLAD.

As an example, on the Too $hort track, the rapper addresses how “life is to some people unbearable.” This is a reference to low frustration tolerance. In simple terms, this unaccommodating attitude is your way of saying to yourself, “I can’t stand it!”

Addressing how people upset themselves with unhelpful outlooks of this sort, the ABC model incorporates Disputation of unproductive assumptions in order to explore Effective new beliefs. For instance, imagine using a high frustration tolerance narrative by believing, “I can stand this!”

However, since you knew nothing about REBT when self-disturbing, the consequence of your unrelenting belief was the completion of suicide. After you’re dead, someone such as Too $hort hears of the news and considers the event “terrible,” which represents an awfulizing belief.

Without challenging this unhelpful conclusion, that individual then self-disturbs into a sorrowful disposition. Rather than your suicide representing an Action-Consequence (A-C) connection, the person uses a Belief-Consequence (B-C) connection that causes sadness.

Helpfully, REBT uses the technique of unconditional acceptance (UA) to relieve suffering. This is accomplished through use of unconditional self-acceptance (USA), unconditional other-acceptance (UOA), and unconditional life-acceptance (ULA).

With my approach to REBT, I incorporate author Stephen Covey’s concepts regarding the circles of control, influence, and concern, as well as an area of no concern. UA maps onto the circle of control (USA), circle of influence (UOA), and circle of concern and area of no concern (ULA).

The circle of control encompasses only oneself, the circle of influence encapsulates elements which may be subject to one’s sway, the circle of concern engrosses most matters one can imagine, and the area of no concern relates to all content which isn’t yet imagined.

Given your newfound understanding of REBT techniques, I invite you to consider that on “Life Is... Too $hort” the rapper states, “Life is too short, would you agree? While I’m living my life, don’t mess with me.” Do you consider any portion of this citation to be self-disturbing? I don’t.

Allow me to explain. First, REBT uses principles of Stoicism. As such, this psychotherapeutic modality acknowledges and accepts the impermanence and uncertainty of life. Given this healthy perspective, relatively speaking, life is too short for a significant amount of the world population.

Second, saying “while I’m living my life, don’t mess with me” serves as an inferred preferential should belief (e.g., you preferably shouldn’t mess with me). This is different than an absolutistic should belief (e.g., you absolutely shouldn’t mess with me).

The former belief is flexible, though the latter isn’t. Now that you have a brief lesson about how REBT functions, understanding how to un-disturb yourself, I’ll shift focus from hip hop music to a hip hop-influenced television show. Let’s see if you can enrich your knowledge along the way.

One of the personally most beloved Comedy Central features I adored was Chappelle’s Show, regarding stand-up comedian and actor Dave Chappelle. In fact, it’s difficult for me to remember laughing as much at any other piece of entertainment as I have with Chappelle’s content.

Perhaps one of the skits I most enjoyed from the show related to the late stand-up comedian and actor Charlie Murphy’s True Hollywood Stories-style sketch that satirized the late singer, songwriter, and record producer Rick James’s reportedly wild lifestyle in the 1980s.

One segment of the sketch involved Murphy stating of James, “Things escalated to the point where, you know, my man got too familiar and I ended up having to whip his ass, man. You know, because, you know, he would step across the line habitually! He’s a habitual line-stepper.”

This idiomatic phrase regarding the crossing or stepping of a line relates to going beyond what is considered proper or acceptable. In the sense that Murphy described James, one source states that the term habitual line-stepper means:

One who constantly steps over “the line,” whatever that line may be. This has the effect of forcing you as an observer to set him or her straight with physical force or the threat of physical force (from Chappelle’s Show: Charlie Murphy True Hollywood Story).

Rick James: “Charlie Murphy!!!” (punch to the head, leaving a mark)

Then Charlie Murphy proceeds to kick Rick James’s ass, because he’s [Murphy] gotta check that shit, so it don’t happen again, forcing him to stop being a habitual line-stepper.

Is it true that because James repeatedly crossed lines which represented healthy boundaries, Murphy was then forced to commit assault and battery? Of course not! That’s not actually how life works.

Perhaps you’ve known of a habitual line-stepper, as Rick James was said to have been. I know one. Growing up, my dad seemed to have relished in the activity of pushing people’s proverbial buttons (doing or saying something just to make someone angry or upset).

Yet, whether crossing the line, line-stepping, or button-pushing is at hand, REBT theory maintains that there is no A-C connection whereby someone like my dad could say or do something that would’ve made me angry or upset. After all, I literally have no buttons to push.

Therefore, with comprehension of the B-C connection, people such as the late Rick James or my dad could’ve habitually line-stepped while others remained largely unaffected. That is, had people understood, believed in, and frequently practiced REBT!

As such, REBT serves as a method of empowerment so that you no longer upset yourself with unhelpful beliefs. The late psychologist who developed REBT, Albert Ellis, and his coauthor once stated about button-pushing (i.e., habitual line-stepping):

What really concerns us, though, is the subtle way we are taught to should [demand] on ourselves and worry about what others think. We are constantly encouraged to question how adequate we are. To a point, there’s nothing wrong with evaluating what we do.

But so many people overdo it and wind up shoulding on themselves and others about too many things. The worst thing about awfulizing and shoulding is that we then make ourselves incredibly susceptible to other people’s pushing our buttons—which is when we give them tremendous power.

If you ask me, life is too short for habitual line-steppers to wield power over my life when they never had such control in the first place. How about you? How much longer do you want to engage in the process of disempowering self-disturbance regarding habitual line-steppers?

If you’re looking for a provider who tries to work to help you understand how thinking impacts physical, mental, emotional, and behavioral elements of your life, I invite you to reach out today by using the contact widget on my website.

As the world’s foremost hip hop-influenced REBT psychotherapist, I’m pleased to try to help people with an assortment of issues from anger (hostility, rage, and aggression) to relational issues, adjustment matters, trauma experience, justice involvement, attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, anxiety and depression, and other mood or personality-related matters.

At Hollings Therapy, LLC, serving all of Texas, I aim to treat clients with dignity and respect while offering a multi-lensed approach to the practice of psychotherapy and life coaching. My mission includes: Prioritizing the cognitive and emotive needs of clients, an overall reduction in client suffering, and supporting sustainable growth for the clients I serve. Rather than simply trying to help you to feel better, I want to try to help you get better!

Deric Hollings, LPC, LCSW

Photo credit, property of Comedy Central, fair use

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