6 ms·

I’m not a fan of meditation, but recognizing that you can actually choose how to feel can be very empowering. I suspect that some people get locked in a catch-

by trevyn 9y ago

I’m not a fan of meditation, but recognizing that you can actually choose how to feel can be very empowering. I suspect that some people get locked in a catch-22 like the following: 1) Because they feel down, they empathize with other people who feel down, and find it personally important to be just, helpful, extra considerate, and thoughtful toward others. 2) Because of this, any indication of injustice or discomfort feels like a personal affront to their values and identity. 3) Any anger or pain resulting from this causes a reaffirmation of #1, and the cycle is reinforced.

ada1981 9y ago
Yes. Learning how to unhook from other peoples trauma and pain was really critical in my recovery. I realized that very often the charge we feel to dig in and solve someone else's issue is often linked to our own unhealed past. Ironically, it's when we heal ourselves that we can actually be of the highest service to those who are hurting.
- icc97 9y ago
  > Ironically, it's when we heal ourselves that we can actually be of the highest service to those who are hurting. I think it's a two fold improvement, you stop being an emotional burden to others who worry about you and you are also more able to support them with their other worries.
  - ada1981 9y ago
    Agreed. And in many cases the relationships we co-create when wounded are co-dependent and so those "worriers" who view emotions as a burden ultimately can't help us anyway -- if they haven't made peace with their own despair, for example, they will never be able to make room for us and will only amplify the pain. Once we take responsibility for our own pain, we are less drawn to hide out taking responsibility for others instead of dealing with our own. And that allows us to lovingly empower others to take responsibility for their pain as well. Of course, we can model what that looks like, we can help them feel pain that they are afraid to touch, but once we show them it's safe to hold, they will reorient towards it quite organically in my experience.
- goodroot 9y ago
  > Ironically, it's when we heal ourselves that we can actually be of the highest service to those who are hurting. Beautifully said. After creating my own healing, I feel compelled to give back in some way. Anytime I see a thread like this, it's a reminder how much work there is to do.
tekkk 9y ago
Well I can tell you a story about the other end of spectrum for self-reinforcing thoughts. I don't know if you have a social anxiety but after an embarrassing social incident you ruminate on your behaviour right? Well take that to its ultimate level and you are constantly being possessed with thoughts about not thinking about a thought that is driving you insane. Just a small idea of the feedback loop: think about a thought. Now try not to think about it. Well you probably can do it but think that you are so anxious that you actually cannot do it. And the act of thinking about it makes you anxious so there's really no way of exiting the loop. Anxiety makes you anxious so to say and you feel fear so terrible that it makes fear you even more. You wake up thinking about it and you fall asleep. Yeah it might not sound relatable but were you to discover the feeling that I mean. Oh boy. There exists emotions inside of us so terrible that you'd wish no human would have to discover. What cured it or well stopped the loop was distracting myself long enough for the anxiety to dissipate and not to remember the feeling (and therefore not to reinforce it). If there was a similar way to do it but for a happy thought I'd be all for it.
- trevyn 9y ago
  >after an embarrassing social incident you ruminate on your behaviour I like to reframe this as gratitude for the opportunity to reflect on a situation and come up with ideas for what I could have done differently, and eager to find analogous opportunities to test these new ideas out. Get enough of these opportunities and do enough “social experiments” and you can become more socially gifted than most. Generally I reframe everything in terms of its positive effects, and I’ve found that some people are disbelieving — “you can’t possibly really think that way.” But it’s fantastically effective for my happiness, and I’ve noticed that excessive irrational positivity is also quite socially magnetic.
- westoncb 9y ago
  Sorry to hear you had to go through it. I feel like I'm getting damn close to finally escaping something very similar now, after several years of it dominating my life. It's was largely a psychosomatic thing for me. It started with an RSI that I'd had for years, then I read about people with horrible RSI problems which turned out to be psychosomatic (through Sarno et al). Unfortunately, because I was already in a fairly paranoid state at this time from various things like a recent Type 1 Diabetes diagnosis (and pushing myself to use computers even though it felt painful)—while I felt I had enough evidence to confirm that my problem was psychosomatic, learning this made things go very wrong. It seemed to me like my mind/body were sort of attacking me and giving me the RSI, and if it's not strictly physical, why should it have to be limited to my wrists? Every semi-controllable aspect of my body started going out of whack if I were to think about it happening (e.g. blushing, sweating, etc.). The longest lasting of these was a very distinct squeezing sensation on my forehead—just like a hand were placed on top of it, in a specific position. The intensity varied with my concern about it. There were times where I noticed everything was fine for a few moments and the sensations were absent—but as soon as I'd check for them they'd immediately come back and my thoughts would be dominated about how the situation was evolving moment to moment. Anyway, I started meditating about 2.5 years ago (spent about a year reading about it before starting a regular practice, mostly avoiding it initially because I'd tried a couple times and it would horribly exacerbate the forehead squeezing sensations), and it's helped me tremendously. It's kind of like it restored a balance in which parts of my mind activate under different conditions: ordinarily someone is anxious and perhaps even aware of it, but they don't try making it go away through thinking about it—they trust at least to a certain extent that their body/mind know what they're doing and the response there is correct, and the 'problem' resolves on its own. At that point in time I essentially never left the conscious thought mode. I can see all those possibilities of acting in one way or the other now—not perfectly, but pretty well often times. And the more clearly I see it the more often I make the choices which make things better rather than worse—finally escaping the feedback loop (woo!). I've got a lot of thoughts on meditation now, and they're mostly positive at this point, but I also don't think I'd have gone so far with it unless I had absolutely no other choice. And it does seem a bit scary at times (mostly just from hearing stories)—but I think people tend to be fine as like as they 'take it easy': avoid extremes. I went through an extended phase where that bothered me a lot, but I feel pretty good about it now.
0xcde4c3db 9y ago
> I’m not a fan of meditation, but recognizing that you can actually choose how to feel can be very empowering. Are you saying that people choose to have mood disorders? It's kind of hard to escape that implication with how you've phrased this.
- grzm 9y ago
  Have you ever calmed yourself down when you've been upset? Or recognize that you're getting emotional and take extra care when you choose your next words? That's the type of thing I believe your parent is getting at. This is some of the motivation behind techniques like CBT. It's not implying that people choose to feel depressed, but that one can have some control over how one is feeling when in the throes of otherwise overpowering emotion.
  - 0xcde4c3db 9y ago
    I would describe those as coping strategies to avoid maladaptive behavior, not changing the underlying emotional state. I find it hard to see how "actually choose how to feel" can mean anything but the latter.
    - grzm 9y ago
      Then I believe, given the greater context, that you're choosing to read it uncharitably. If your point is to search for greater clarification and mutual understanding, as opposed to argument, I think you can likely do better than your current approach.
      - 0xcde4c3db 9y ago
        > If your point is to search for greater clarification and mutual understanding, as opposed to argument I don't believe those things are actually opposed in any meaningful way. Also, I think it's possible to take the principle of charity too far. At some point, it's just as much putting words in people's mouths as a knee-jerk misinterpretation.
- 9y ago

by trevyn 9y ago

ada1981 9y ago

Yes. Learning how to unhook from other peoples trauma and pain was really critical in my recovery. I realized that very often the charge we feel to dig in and solve someone else's issue is often linked to our own unhealed past. Ironically, it's when we heal ourselves that we can actually be of the highest service to those who are hurting.

icc97 9y ago
> Ironically, it's when we heal ourselves that we can actually be of the highest service to those who are hurting. I think it's a two fold improvement, you stop being an emotional burden to others who worry about you and you are also more able to support them with their other worries.
- ada1981 9y ago
  Agreed. And in many cases the relationships we co-create when wounded are co-dependent and so those "worriers" who view emotions as a burden ultimately can't help us anyway -- if they haven't made peace with their own despair, for example, they will never be able to make room for us and will only amplify the pain. Once we take responsibility for our own pain, we are less drawn to hide out taking responsibility for others instead of dealing with our own. And that allows us to lovingly empower others to take responsibility for their pain as well. Of course, we can model what that looks like, we can help them feel pain that they are afraid to touch, but once we show them it's safe to hold, they will reorient towards it quite organically in my experience.
goodroot 9y ago
> Ironically, it's when we heal ourselves that we can actually be of the highest service to those who are hurting. Beautifully said. After creating my own healing, I feel compelled to give back in some way. Anytime I see a thread like this, it's a reminder how much work there is to do.

tekkk 9y ago

Well I can tell you a story about the other end of spectrum for self-reinforcing thoughts. I don't know if you have a social anxiety but after an embarrassing social incident you ruminate on your behaviour right? Well take that to its ultimate level and you are constantly being possessed with thoughts about not thinking about a thought that is driving you insane. Just a small idea of the feedback loop: think about a thought. Now try not to think about it. Well you probably can do it but think that you are so anxious that you actually cannot do it. And the act of thinking about it makes you anxious so there's really no way of exiting the loop. Anxiety makes you anxious so to say and you feel fear so terrible that it makes fear you even more. You wake up thinking about it and you fall asleep. Yeah it might not sound relatable but were you to discover the feeling that I mean. Oh boy. There exists emotions inside of us so terrible that you'd wish no human would have to discover. What cured it or well stopped the loop was distracting myself long enough for the anxiety to dissipate and not to remember the feeling (and therefore not to reinforce it). If there was a similar way to do it but for a happy thought I'd be all for it.

trevyn 9y ago
>after an embarrassing social incident you ruminate on your behaviour I like to reframe this as gratitude for the opportunity to reflect on a situation and come up with ideas for what I could have done differently, and eager to find analogous opportunities to test these new ideas out. Get enough of these opportunities and do enough “social experiments” and you can become more socially gifted than most. Generally I reframe everything in terms of its positive effects, and I’ve found that some people are disbelieving — “you can’t possibly really think that way.” But it’s fantastically effective for my happiness, and I’ve noticed that excessive irrational positivity is also quite socially magnetic.
westoncb 9y ago
Sorry to hear you had to go through it. I feel like I'm getting damn close to finally escaping something very similar now, after several years of it dominating my life. It's was largely a psychosomatic thing for me. It started with an RSI that I'd had for years, then I read about people with horrible RSI problems which turned out to be psychosomatic (through Sarno et al). Unfortunately, because I was already in a fairly paranoid state at this time from various things like a recent Type 1 Diabetes diagnosis (and pushing myself to use computers even though it felt painful)—while I felt I had enough evidence to confirm that my problem was psychosomatic, learning this made things go very wrong. It seemed to me like my mind/body were sort of attacking me and giving me the RSI, and if it's not strictly physical, why should it have to be limited to my wrists? Every semi-controllable aspect of my body started going out of whack if I were to think about it happening (e.g. blushing, sweating, etc.). The longest lasting of these was a very distinct squeezing sensation on my forehead—just like a hand were placed on top of it, in a specific position. The intensity varied with my concern about it. There were times where I noticed everything was fine for a few moments and the sensations were absent—but as soon as I'd check for them they'd immediately come back and my thoughts would be dominated about how the situation was evolving moment to moment. Anyway, I started meditating about 2.5 years ago (spent about a year reading about it before starting a regular practice, mostly avoiding it initially because I'd tried a couple times and it would horribly exacerbate the forehead squeezing sensations), and it's helped me tremendously. It's kind of like it restored a balance in which parts of my mind activate under different conditions: ordinarily someone is anxious and perhaps even aware of it, but they don't try making it go away through thinking about it—they trust at least to a certain extent that their body/mind know what they're doing and the response there is correct, and the 'problem' resolves on its own. At that point in time I essentially never left the conscious thought mode. I can see all those possibilities of acting in one way or the other now—not perfectly, but pretty well often times. And the more clearly I see it the more often I make the choices which make things better rather than worse—finally escaping the feedback loop (woo!). I've got a lot of thoughts on meditation now, and they're mostly positive at this point, but I also don't think I'd have gone so far with it unless I had absolutely no other choice. And it does seem a bit scary at times (mostly just from hearing stories)—but I think people tend to be fine as like as they 'take it easy': avoid extremes. I went through an extended phase where that bothered me a lot, but I feel pretty good about it now.

0xcde4c3db 9y ago

> I’m not a fan of meditation, but recognizing that you can actually choose how to feel can be very empowering. Are you saying that people choose to have mood disorders? It's kind of hard to escape that implication with how you've phrased this.

grzm 9y ago
Have you ever calmed yourself down when you've been upset? Or recognize that you're getting emotional and take extra care when you choose your next words? That's the type of thing I believe your parent is getting at. This is some of the motivation behind techniques like CBT. It's not implying that people choose to feel depressed, but that one can have some control over how one is feeling when in the throes of otherwise overpowering emotion.
- 0xcde4c3db 9y ago
  I would describe those as coping strategies to avoid maladaptive behavior, not changing the underlying emotional state. I find it hard to see how "actually choose how to feel" can mean anything but the latter.
  - grzm 9y ago
    Then I believe, given the greater context, that you're choosing to read it uncharitably. If your point is to search for greater clarification and mutual understanding, as opposed to argument, I think you can likely do better than your current approach.
    - 0xcde4c3db 9y ago
      > If your point is to search for greater clarification and mutual understanding, as opposed to argument I don't believe those things are actually opposed in any meaningful way. Also, I think it's possible to take the principle of charity too far. At some point, it's just as much putting words in people's mouths as a knee-jerk misinterpretation.
9y ago