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Dear Javier,
I have learned some somatic psychotherapy techniques such as using descriptive language and titration/pendulation. If I’m in the zone and my mind/mood is right, I get some relaxation.
Good, at least you get some relief from time to time.
You’ve mentioned that mornings are the hardest for you. Today I’ve come across about a youtube video that talks about the morning anxiety, how it relates to our inner child, and how to lessen it. The title is “Anxiety in the morning – The adult and the inner child – Episode 7“, by Patrick Teahan.
It says that our experience in the morning mirrors our experience when we were growing up. So if you grew up in a chaotic and violent home, it wouldn’t be surprising to experience that same sense of terror and helplessness that you’ve experienced back then. The video offers some suggestions what to do to reduce that helplessness and anxiety. Let me know if you found it useful.
I am glad you’re reading the book by Dr. Nicole LePera. You say: I wish I would have known these things in my early 20s. – You know what they say: better later than never. You’ve still got plenty of years ahead of you, which you can spend in a better, more positive mindset, free from false beliefs.
As for your purpose, perhaps you can set small, doable goals for yourself every day (as you’ll see in the video I’ve mentioned). Accomplishing them will give you a sense of agency, i.e. you won’t feel so helplessness any more, you’ll feel more in control, more capable. This might help you feel more purpose and meaning in life too…
This morning I was given the task of mapping “Realistic Picture of Myself”. It was daunting and really left me perplexed as I had to write down how I see myself (Negative(N) and Positive(P) things). I don’t know why, but I will write down my thoughts. Maybe it will give me some inner peace or maybe it’s just to address my messed up self-image. Anyway,
1. Physical Appearance
- Short (5’8/5’9 feet) – N
- Curly hair – N
- Bulky Nose – N
- Hunching – N
- Short legs – N
- Short Torso – N
- Beady Eyes – N
- Chipped teeth – N
- No defined chin – N
- Skin rashes – N
- Skinny – N
- Olive skin – P
2. Personality
- Cold and introvert – N
- Insecure and always on alert – N
- Easily annoyed and aggressive – N
- Distant and full of self-doubt – N
- Trapped in my past – N
- Unloveable and Lost – N
- Moody – N
- Emotional – N
- Overly Sensitive – N
- Weak-minded – N
- Fearful – N
- Pessimist – N
- Sometimes apathetic – N
3. Mental Functioning
- Impulsive and act before I think – N
- Not good to resolve problems and issues – N
- Always looking for the easy-way out – N
- Non-confrontational, “run” and “hide” from problems – N
- No cognitive and social skills – N
- Good Memory – P
- Learn by doing – P
4. Emotional Landscape
- Moody, long periods of low and complete lack of self-esteem. – N
- Long periods of low energy and depression – N
- Insecurity and lack of self-esteem since childhood. -N
- Jealousy, fear, anger and regrets -N
- Stuck in the past, and second-guessing all life decisions. – N
- Give up and quit before even trying. – N
- Trouble expressing feelings, and easily lash out/blow up on family and friends. – N
5. Performance at School/Work
- Never been any good at school – N
- Lazy, always looking for the short-cuts and easy ways out. – N
- Never been eager to learn or had any discipline – N
- Unfocused and easy distracted – N
- Picks up things easy – P
6. Performance on Everyday tasks
- All tasks are doable and easy to follow – P
- Procrastinate every task – N
- Easily bored – N
- Terrible at scheduling and planning activities. – N
7. Friendships
- Don’t have any close friends or acquaintances – N
- Not good at keeping friends – N
- Trust issues and always on alert – N
- Always striving for giving a good first impression – N/P
- Easily forget important dates and happenings- N
8. How other People view me
- Strange and awkward – N
- Reserved and suspicious – N
- Boring and complete lack of self-esteem – N
- Unattractive and non-existent – N
- Pathetic, unloveable and lonely – N
- Dumb and Mentally disturbed – N
9. Love Relationship
- Protecting and caring – P
- Lack of patience and understanding – N
- Immature and non confrontational – N
- Hide feelings and afraid of expressing my true feelings – N
10. How will people remember you
- Loser and unsuccessful – N
- Didn’t manage to maintain and/or make any relationships – N
- Waste of opportunities – N
- Waste of potential – N
- Sad, depressed and hopeless – N
- Poisonous – N
Tomorrow, I will have to challenge each of these thoughts and address if they are true or not.
This has been the most productive session for me so far. I know there are many negatives, but this is what is inside my head.
Javier,
Look up on youtube: Life Without Limbs: Nick Vujicic Ministries
He has a lot of inspirational messages. How about try to watch daily? I’ve also started watching Fresh Anointing on youtube.
There are many more.
I’m glad you are forgiving people. You said that you still hold a lot of resentment. I would say you might want to forgive but your emotional state isn’t matching that intention. Anger is okay but it points to something deeper.
I like how you told advice that you are going through something too and it was okay to be lost sometimes.
I worry a lot and can think in all-or-nothing thinking. If one thing goes wrong, I think all is wrong. And vice versa with being right. I don’t ALWAYS think like this. But I often do. I realized that my brain was telling me one thing and my soul was telling me another. My brain tells me to think small and be scared. My soul tells me to expand and live for God and meaning and purpose and something greater than myself. My brain wants me to be defeated and joyless. My soul wants me to be like a child again full of wonder and joy. It’s a constant battle. It’s a spiritual battle and we are ALL going through it.
Like you told that stranger on that forum, you are not alone in your suffering. I’m not going anywhere. I know it’s hard right now. I can’t help you to find all the answers. It’s going to be hard. But you have nothing to worry about. The worst is over. You have PTSD. It’s just processing life and picking yourself up again and leaning on God. I would say that my faith helps me a lot. I don’t know yours but whatever holds meaning for you spiritually, it’s time to listen to it.
We can’t know what’s going to happen. I can’t tell you it’s all going to turn around. All I can tell you is that I’m here for you. I hope that you know you are worth helping. I see good in you. I see a person who has promise. I see a person who is caring. I see a person who is just scared. That’s all it is. You are just scared. And you have every right to be. You’re still here aren’t you? That’s your sign that it’s okay to let go now. For a moment, set it all down. For a moment, release your struggles and exhale. You are Beloved. You are enough. You are good. You are going to be okay once you get a handle on your emotional state. That’s what you are up against – your brain is trying to work you up into defeatism. You can’t see through it, but I can. I can tell you that you are punishing yourself and holding onto anger towards past injustices. You haven’t released your grip once even a little bit. Try surrendering.
I’ll be here to hold space with you too.
Again, I ask you- what would you tell someone in your position?
Sarah
Dear Javier,
it’s good to read you had a productive therapy session, with lots of self-reflection and making a kind of inventory of where you are at mentally and emotionally. I am glad it helped you! And it’s also great that you’re going to mass, socializing with people, listening to their stories and how they’ve overcome their hardships. It’s so sweet that you primary school teacher recognized you, and that you opened up to her, expressing your appreciation and gratitude.
To be honest, I have always felt ungrateful towards people who helped mold me.
No wonder, since the most important people who molded you (your parents) did a poor job. Your father abused you, your mother failed to protect you from abuse. It’s no wonder you didn’t feel any gratitude to authority figures, including those who were good and kind, like your primary school teacher.
In a response to Sarah’s question: “How are you protective and caring?”, you wrote:
I always feel responsible for other peoples feelings. Especially towards my family, as I feel responsible for all their pain and hurting. As a result, I go to great lengths to avoid conflicts, and seldom admit when my feelings are hurt.
In trying to protect and care for others, you suppressed your own feelings and needs. You blamed yourself for your mother’s pain, when it wasn’t your fault at all. That’s what a child does – it always protects the parent, and blames themself, trying to change and become “better”, hoping that this would make the parent happy.
From very early in your childhood, you thought that something was wrong with you, first when your father was beating you, and then when your mother wouldn’t protect you from him. You took responsibility for their abuse and lack of protection, you thought you were bad and deserved it. And then later when you started acting out, you kind of “proved” to yourself that you are indeed bad and deserve poor treatment.
See how it goes? You were an innocent child who took the blame for being abused, believing there was something terribly wrong with you. And you lived your life with that false belief, acting out, doing drugs, not paying attention at school etc.
How does it feel to protect and care?
Honestly, it sucks big time. Because, it reminds me how neglected, hurt and tormented I was. And, I tend to start with the “what ifs”, “I wish”, and “Why wasn’t there anyone there for me”. The more I protect and care about my nieces, the more devastated and anxious I feel. Somehow, I see myself in them, my brittle inner-child that is broken into thousand pieces. I get reminded of how brittle and weak I really am. A tiny bump in the road will break me.
You indeed were neglected and hurt as a child, and you had no one to protect you. A small child left to his own devices in the midst of domestic violence is horrible indeed. That’s why you feel brittle and weak now. It’s the inner child in you. What you are doing now, with therapy and self-help and sharing here, is you’re strengthening your adult self. Your adult self isn’t helpless like your inner child is, it has resources to help you. So the task would be to strengthen your adult self, so you can defend and protect and care for your inner child.
One way to strengthen your adult self is to understand and accept that it wasn’t your fault that the abuse happened. That you’re not inherently bad and worthless, that you didn’t deserve it. So you stop taking the blame and responsibility for other people abusing you. Specially for your parents abusing you, i.e. failing to protect you. This is how you will start protecting your inner child. If you believe you deserved the abuse, you cannot protect your inner child, and healing cannot happen. Can you see that?
Hi Javier
So many people have trouble asking and accepting help. Myself included. Like you it feels like something I’m just not capable of doing. Even when I do reach out their are parts of me that hold back. So frustrating getting in my own way. In my case I don’t think its my mind that won’t let me accept help but a deep routed fear of being vulnerable, rejected, asked to do something I don’t want to… so many fears. At the root of all the fears that I can’t and wont be Loved. To live in the pain and loneliness of not taking the risk to love and be loved OR living in the pain of the fear of taking the risk and having it confirmed. I am not a brave man.
I envy everyone, I’m jealous of peaceful and carefree they look. I’m not sure how to cope, how to live, how to get inner peace.
One thing I am sure about is that very few people are as peaceful and carefree as the look. Jealousy is a waist of time. No one gets to ‘know’ how another is experiencing themselves and Compassion only asks that we be kind, to others and ourselves, and not assume. A sure fire way of remaining stuck is comparing ourselves to others and thinking ‘if only’. In a odd way I think it gives us permission, a excuse, to remain as we are even as we work so hard to grow and move forward.
Now I’m afraid that there are no options left
My gut tells me that the way out isn’t up but down and through. To feel what one feels without labeling or measuring. Sometimes we reach a point where all the self help and analyzing becomes a way of avoiding feeling what we feel. We keep on seeking to avoid finding.
I think of a person caught in a riptide our undertow, the more they struggle the more likely they will tire and drown. The key to getting out of such a situation is to remain calm.
There is a time for all things. Up to this point reading through your post I picture someone who has and is trying everything except being still. If the problem comes from the mind, allow the mind to be still. That dos not mean having no thoughts but the practice of not attaching oneself a thought. Labeling , measuring , judging it, if only… our thoughts… Thoughts flow you are not your thoughts. Once can be still within the tempest of ones thoughts.
This year I start my meditation (and before I go to sleep) with the following from TS Elliot
I ask of my soul, be still and wait without hope, for hope would be hope for the wrong thing;
Wait without love, for love would be love of the wrong thing;
There is yet faith, but the faith and the love are all in the waiting.
Wait without thought, for I am not ready for thought:So the darkness shall become the light, and the stillness dancing.
And Or
Be still and know that I am G_d
Be still and know that I am
Be still and know
Be still
BeSometimes it helps… In the time of waiting and stillness I float. The tide takes me where it will, but I participate, to tired to fight, I notice that calmly moving a little this way or that, I have influence on the direction…
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