RELATIONSHIPS: It is time to unlearn bad behaviour

“Learning is for monkeys and kindergartners. If you want to become wise beyond your years, try forgetting a few things for once.” Those are the words of Scott Ginsberg, who has written a book titled, The Power of Approachability.

That statement felt like an insult when I first read it, but as I thought through it, I saw his point. And the point is this; we all need to learn to unlearn certain things so that we can relate genuinely. Hear me out.

In his characteristic bluntness, Ginsberg says: “Any idiot can be smart. It takes a real genius to unlearn.” In friendlier terms, it means that anyone can learn to do things right, but only a genius can unlearn something, to experience genuine change. To unlearn is not merely to abandon something, but also to mentally undo the rationale behind it so that the resulting change is not cosmetic. We’ll understand that better as we look at some examples below.

WHY UNLEARN?

There are two important reasons. First, there are ideas and practices that may have been okay at some point, but with time, they have lost their place.

Here is an example. Recently, I overheard a conversation between an elderly man and a young woman about marriage. It was in a matatu, and the woman was on her way to a friend’s wedding. They both agreed that marriages were facing a difficult time today, but each had a different explanation for this.

But there was one issue that both fully agreed on, and this was that nowadays, young people operate in groups: they move together, eat together, dress the same, live in the same neighbourhoods and set up businesses together. Even after marriage, some are unable to do things differently, carrying on with this group mentality years into their marriage.

The result is that the relationship experiences lots of external interference, and this could lead to serious conflict between the couple. In concluding the matter, the duo agreed that couples must accept that they are a separate unit from their friends once they get married. I couldn’t agree more, and in essence, that is what unlearning is, a mental shift that influences behaviour.

 The second reason for unlearning things is when we have learnt the wrong stuff. We might have learnt from our cultures or from the societies that we grew in, making some of them very difficult to change.

Let me use an illustration to explain this. Many of us African men find it very difficult to use terms such as honey, sweetheart or darling to refer to our partners, especially after we get into a committed relationship. In my view, the principal reason for this is that we are trained to relate with each other in terms of the roles attached to us by society, rather than relate to each other as individuals.

A man might therefore refer to his wife as the mother of my children or use the term “mama wa kwangu” (woman of my house), focusing on her home-making role. What we need to unlearn is the traditional approach of relating to our partners based on our roles, and instead learn to view each other as individuals.

CONCLUSION

Let us face it; unlearning a habit is a difficult thing to do for most of us. What we have always known and practiced is what guides us and gives us confidence. On the other hand, unlearning demands change that goes beyond learning new skills, to undoing the mental structures that support unproductive behaviour.

That, my friends, is my challenge and yours today; unlearn what needs to be done away with and discover a fresh way of relating with each other.