Dealing With Givers In Relationships: Perspectives From Clinical Biopsychology

When I use the term Giver, I am referring to people who experience positive emotions when they give to others

. They have problems in allowing others to do for them since they feel uncomfortable with this. If they accept from others, they feel they should do something in return. Thus, it is often simply easier for the giver not to accept from others.

Despite other authors using the same term of giver, I use it from a completely different perspective. This is based on Clinical Biopsychology which comes from the Dimensional Systems Model of brain operations. I do not believe givers are better than takers since both are equally selfish. How can givers be selfish?

They do the things that turn on positive feelings and turn off negative emotions. Therefore, they are doing things in relationships which lead to more favorable internal states. That is not to say that others do not benefit, only that the behavior is selfish.

In relationship therapy the first step is assisting the client in understanding why the giver does the things they do. This helps in accepting the giver is incapable of becoming a different person. That is not to say that it is not possible for the giver to change behavior, only that they will never become a taker.

Givers want to be perceived as being the good person and they never want to feel like a bad person. In fact, they spend much of their time in relationships trying to avoid guilt. Relationship therapy leads to the approach of using this basic pattern to lead to the most favorable outcomes when dealing with a giver.

For example, givers play by rules that define being a good versus a bad person. They never feel it is acceptable to hurt someone. This means that saying to the giver that when they do something negative, it hurts. This leads immediately to the giver pausing in the discussion and trying to determine if they are being inappropriate. If terms like one is frustrated or angry with the giver are used instead of hurt, the giver typically defends his or her position and proceeds to tell why they are not being bad.

Thus, relationship therapy is designed to give a number of practical solutions for various problems that emerge when dealing with givers.

by: Richard Rice

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