Dear Javairia:

I re-read some of our communication in your previous thread, starting in April 2020 (I appreciate it that you didn’t delete it), so to better answer your recent post. You can re-read it yourself, most of it is very relevant to the present, and because it exists, there is no reason for me to repeat things I already posted there at length.

In your first post yesterday, you shared that you felt guilty and ashamed, like “a terrible friend” because you worry that the words you used to comfort an anxious friend “weren’t the best at comforting her anxiousness”, or “made it worse by saying something that wasn’t the best to say”.

This conflict reminds me of one conflict (of the many, I am sure) that you had last year: you texted a friend: “I really appreciate that you find me reliable. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and being open to me about stuff“- a perfectly worded, kind reply, nothing offensive about it at all, and yet, at the time you worried that maybe when she read the text, she thought to herself something like this: Javairia did not say anything about me being a good friend to her! How dare she think that she is superior to me! She is stuck up! (“I should’ve texted appreciation for her as a friend too.. I feel like I was being too stuck up, or made her feel like I’m somehow superior to her emotionally”).

Just like all your polite and kind posts to me and to other members on your threads, this text of last year was was very kind. There was absolutely nothing offensive about that text, no valid criticism of it can be found…but an invalid criticism can be made by an angry and crazy person.

I will give you an example of an-angry-and-crazy-person’s thinking by pointing to a sentence you wrote yesterday, in the first of three posts: “I don’t want to brush this guilt away by just calling it ‘bad person’ complex“. If I was an-angry-and-crazy-person, this is one way for me to interpret this sentence: Javairia thinks it’s not just a bad-person-complex, she thinks it’s something else.. but I  know that it’s just a-bad-person-complex.. Javairia is telling me that I am wrong!? How dare she?! After all my posts to her, all the time I spent answering her, this is how she repays me???!!!

Again, if was an angry-crazy-person, this is one way I could interpret your sentence. Please pay attention to the following: there is no way for you to prevent angry-crazy-people from interpreting your words in crazy ways. Every sentence that you utter or type can be interpreted in a a crazy way or in a few crazy ways by different crazy people. As a matter of fact, even if you don’t say anything, not a single word, some crazy person will complain: I know what she is thinking! She is thinking that…

Who has been the angry-and-crazy-person in your life? Hasn’t it been your mother who interpreted your words (and others’ words) in crazy ways, seeing offense and insult where there was none?

You wrote last year: “I ‘hear’ my words being misunderstood and me being accused on the most random things I do. More than half of the time I imagine the things before hand; what are all the possible ways my words or actions getting twisted enough in others’ eyes to be taken or misunderstood as bad/evil. It has really become a sub-conscious thing now, and I realize it AFTER I’m done accusing my own self and overthinking a little action of mine. But most of the times I don’t have the ability to distinguish, if my word, or action really hurt or affected the other party negatively or is it totally an irrational critic inside of me speaking”-

– You used a kinder word (irrational) than the word used (crazy), but yes, the irrational/ crazy critic inside of you takes after your mother, your real-life irrational/ angry-and-crazy critic, twisting your words and actions, misinterpreting them in irrational/ crazy ways.

Good thing most people are not as irrational/ crazy as your mother, so in real-life you don’t need to worry about every possible crazy interpretations of your words and actions. It will be possible for you to distinguish between your irrational inner critic and your rational inner critic  when you weaken the first and strengthen the second over time and practice.

* Your father, in the context of your phone interactions with him, has his part in creating that angry-and-crazy inner critic: “In his random outbursts, I’ve learned to stay silent. Because if I reply with anything, even it it has a nice intention, he uses it against me to tell me that I support my mum AGAINST HIM. And my brain equals that out-of-blue arguments or maybe I’m a bad person”.

Because your words and actions were misinterpreted in crazy ways, presented to you as dangerous and destructive, you.. believed that indeed everything you say and do is very powerful in dangerous and destructive ways, so you figured:  better be very, very careful: “I assume I have this power to destruct with every single word and with the tiniest action… And so I have lived in constant balancing and over analyzing of each and every word because it might also DESTROY someone”.

Back to your recent posts, “Am I a terrible friend and listener?”- no, you are probably the best friend and best listener your friend has. “I wish to improve on what to say next time”- like I wrote, there is no way to prevent an-angry-and-crazy-person from misinterpret your words and actions in crazy ways. The improvement I recommend is in replacing the irrational,  angry-and-crazy inner critic with a rational, calm-and-sane inner critic.

“Are there any positive affirmations or a different perspective to view these episodes of ‘bad person’ complex with?”- I presented the different perspective above. Regarding affirmations, can you come up with a few, based on this different perspective, when you are ready?

In your most recent post, you asked: “Did you deal with the similar problem of high expectations imposed by your daydreaming on your future self, or did it not affect you that way?.. Feel free to answer or ignore this”- you added the last seven words because your inner critic thought that your question might destroy me… To the question I am okay with answering best I can: in my daydreaming all the good things happened quickly, so that created in me a false expectation that good things in life happen fast. I did not have an understanding that good things (like a healthy relationship and a healthy mind) happen very slowly, very gradually, over a long period of time and practice, with ups and downs, learning and re-learning, evaluating and re-evaluating.

anita

You are welcome, Javairia. Please take all the time that you need, there is no rush.

anita

Dear Javairia:

You are very welcome. I am glad that you found parts of my post to you helpful and/ or inspiring. Feel free to post anytime you would like my input: I will be glad to read from you and reply to you anytime.

anita

You are welcome, Javairia. Thank you for always responding, and for responding graciously.

anita