Leaving "The Rope" on the Ground is Easy with Powerful Practice

Among the messages featured in the CPI family of posters, the reminder not to “pick up the rope” is among the most-appreciated. The poster, which reads “Don’t Pick Up the Rope” features a boy holding a rope in a tug-of-war; he sports an intense look on his face. Unseen is the person on the other end of the rope, deciding whether or not to engage in the tug-of-war with this young man.

Unit Five in the CPI Nonviolent Crisis Intervention course really focuses in on this idea of avoiding “picking up the rope.” It’s easier said than done! Unfortunately, our clients (and even our colleagues) can put us in situations where we have a hard time leaving “the rope” on the ground. When a person is confronting us, demonstrating defensive-level behaviors, it is a challenge to keep our composure. However, this unit gives us some perspective and some helpful advice.

First, this unit covers “precipitating factors,” defined by CPI as “factors that influence behavior.” I teach this topic with the help of an iceberg…or at least the picture of an iceberg. After telling a story about a negative incident that I experienced on a plane, which resulted in one man shoving another man, I write “The Shove” on the upper part of the iceberg; this is the part that people can see. I then ask my participants to brainstorm factors that may have influenced that behavior. People come up with many reasons for this shove, most of which revealing reasons that may cause us to have some empathy for the man demonstrating the risk behavior. The purpose of the activity is not to justify the shove; more so, the activity is designed to allow participants to recognize that it’s easier not to pick up the rope when we consider the precipitating factors that could be affecting that individual.

One CPI Global Professional Manager, Lesley Rynders, sometimes expands on this unit by asking participants to form a “human continuum.” On one side of the room, she puts a number one, representing behaviors that don’t bother a person; on the other side of the room, she puts a ten to represent behaviors that may bother a person a lot and may require all of your coping skills with which not to react and “pick up the rope.” She then reads a series of client behaviors and has people move on the continuum, between 1 and 10, showing the variance in the way participants view client behaviors. Often, she begins with “being insulted about something you’re sensitive about,” allowing an immediate range to form. She then jumps into behaviors that allow people to put the aforementioned insult in perspective. Some of these behaviors include…

• Being hit
• Being spit at
• Being threatened
• Having a member of your family threatened

She then asks how knowing this range of reactions can help us in working with our co-workers. In the end, she wants colleagues to decide how we how can we support one another.

Another person who effectively expands on this unit is CPI Global Professional Instructor Elizabeth Mesjak. She believes that we are “teaching our participants how to have empathy for others” in times where having empathy can be most trying. For this unit, she likes to use activities that elicit effective conversation. She points out, if someone spits in a person’s face, that person is going to have a hard time not reacting. Some people would have a hard time not responding physically. She asks, “What do we do when we can’t step away…when we have to be with this person who is making us incredibly uncomfortable and frustrated?” Elizabeth has people begin by writing down behaviors that upset them. She has them consider what words alone may cause a person to be upset. “Words that challenge a person’s race or sex are going to cause people to be upset,” she said.

And while being in these situations may not be fun, this unit gets people talking, and that can be a lot of fun. As training facilitators, our goal should be to guide conversation to a place that creates an imprint on participant minds…one they’ll remember the next time they are working with a person in-crisis who desperately wants us to “pick up the rope.” We have the power to avoid this, and that power can gain a lot of strength through our conversations in this unit. “It’s a unit that allows [participants] to get more into an honest conversation,” Elizabeth said.

The unit finishes by sharing the ideas of “Rational Detachment” and “Integrated Experience,” two concepts that, when considered, help us to be cognizant of the Precipitating Factors our clients may be demonstrating. I hope you can find a way to make this unit fun to teach and memorable for your participants.