Hi Sufi

Thanks for your post. I would like to share my experience with you and hope it will provide a different perspective for you.

I must have read over 150 self-help books few years ago to start the journey that you wish to commence now and none actually helped in the long term. Everyone is providing their own personal experience in the books but we are not them. Everyone on this planet is one and unique. Our thoughts, personalities, DNA, coping skills etc do not coincide with anyone else on this planet. We are as unique as it gets. What might work for your mate may not work for someone else. This is the reason why giving or seeking advice is sought with so much caution as one can only provide their personal opinion but it may or may not be suitable for the concerned individual.

I do refer to some books on a regular basis such as those from Louise Hay, Susan Jeffers and Cheryl Davidson but it is purely to calm me down if I am being highly emotionally charged. The following have been the most helpful in terms of practicality : regular practice of meditation( heaps of good stuff on you tube); practicing gratitude and positive affirmations daily ; breathing exercises; good nutrition; 8 hour sleep ; and exercise. I am becoming more authentic “me” every day. Now, people do not threaten me as I am able to appreciate that hey, everyone is unique so there is no competition. There is no resentment and we are all doing our best to perform our role on the life stage. It is all good and there is enough for everyone on this planet. This transformation has made a huge change in the people that I attract nowadays. I am able to learn freely from every interaction and relationships do not feel heavy or draining anymore.

Does this make sense ?

Cheers,

J

I love what Jasmine said 🙂

I’ve got a lot of pointers from different books, and I think that there are some answers to particular problems, but it’s still of course you who has to do the work.

One book, or rather the concept, helped me the most to overcome my biggest problems. It was Susan Anderson’s Taming Your Outer Child. In essence, the idea is that the Inner Child is our feelings; what we feel when we encounter something in this world. It could be joy, fear, anxiousness, etc. The Outer Child acts out the feelings. Unfortunately the actions aren’t terribly mature. So when we feel anxious about something, we might react to it by eating a cake. Eating the cake does not solve the situation that we feel anxious about, and we know that, but do it anyway and then feel shame later. When we feel shame, we might resolve the shame by eating more.

In your case, it could be that you feel under threat in some ways, and react to it with anger and saying things you later regret. It takes over and it’s hard to control. Then later, you might feel bad about it, which pretty much keeps you in that state of being under threat; knowing that you’ve acted in a way that is not socially acceptable, and that can lead to rejection and abandonment. That’s a lot of stress to carry around and leads to a perpetual cycle of anger and fear.

I suffered from all kinds of bad behavior and it really helped me to see this reactionary part that acted out these things as a separate entity from my self. That way I became more compassionate towards myself and was able to slowly start taking control over my own actions. When I noticed that I started to get out of control, I had a dialogue with my “Outer Child”. “No, it’s not a good idea to do that right now. It’s not going to help.” I didn’t yell at myself or cause any more distress. The drama started to die down, because I didn’t allow it to happen and I didn’t make it worse by stressing about it.

So in my humble opinion, it’s not about you becoming a better person. You already are a great person. You just need to learn new ways to cope with the stress in life. What you might’ve learned in your early years has been adequate back then, but now you need a new set of tools. Just like with other skills, hardly any of us are born with them. We need to learn them and develop them. Those skills aren’t who we are, so if we’re not that good at some skill right now, it doesn’t mean that we’re bad.

I don’t think you are an angry person. I don’t think anyone is. That’s just your way of coping with things at the moment. You’ll just need to find other ways to cope with stress and pain.

• This reply was modified 10 years, 9 months ago by The Ruminant.

Thanks Sufi and The Ruminant for your kindness. I had a huge and beaming smile on my face after reading your words.

Thanks The Ruminant and Prabha for your excellent suggestions :).

When my spiritual teacher found me a few years ago, these were the 2 things, which were imparted to me : you are 100 percent responsible for everything that happens in your life; and you be the book and you be the reader. Being who I was at the time, I took these words of wisdom as “total crap” and found it hard to assimilate.

After regular and devoted practice of mindfulness over the last 2 years atleast, these words have started to resonate with my being and now, they are part of who I am. The right kind of Meditation helps us to find all the wisdom that is contained within us. We all have the power to dive into our own inner world to find the solutions to all our dilemmas, which are unique to us and us alone. What it takes is regular and devoted practice and unfortunately, there is no end to this learning. We will never graduate from this life school until we die and after that god knows ;).

Cheers,

J