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If you want to learn more about this I would suggest reading books by Louise Hay. I don't know if OP got the idea from her, or if Louise is the first one to com

by CWIZO 14y ago

If you want to learn more about this I would suggest reading books by Louise Hay. I don't know if OP got the idea from her, or if Louise is the first one to come up with this, but she writes and practises this extensively. One of the key concepts from her books is that we are all victims of victims. Meaning that we got our bad thoughts from our parents who in turn got them from their parents and so on. And the most important part of solving of any problem you may have is to get to the root cause, which is usually some interaction that you had, as a child, with your parents. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Hay http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louise_Hay http://www.louisehay.com/ http://www.louisehay.com/

manmal 14y ago
Exactly, wanted to post just that. The "trick" to say those affirmations to yourself in the mirror is her way of improving their effectiveness. I love her books, and her words go into the heart. A must read for people not loving their life as it is. ADDED: I always had the feel that Swombat is into this kind of thing, cool that he finally writes about thought-hacking and affirmations.
wpietri 14y ago
I'm unfamiliar with that work, and I'm not much of an affirmations person. But the victims of victims thing makes a ton of sense to me now that I'm old enough to have watched kids grow up. Kids are incredible sponges early in life. They soak up so much. In the store I see parents saying things to their kids and think, "Wow, that's an expensive therapy bill in the making." Personally, I don't worry too much about remembering the particular interactions in my past. I treat it more as a reverse engineering problem. Given my behavior X, in what circumstances could that have been adaptive?
sopooneo 14y ago
One thing I am surprised by with these types of theories is the lack of awareness that some people have happy childhoods with parents who don't scar them in any way. It's like it's taken as a given that a legacy of sadness runs through every family.
- ScottBurson 14y ago
  > some people have happy childhoods with parents who don't scar them in any way Actually, they don't. All families are dysfunctional; there is no perfect childhood. Everyone is scarred. This is, ironically, a wonderful thing! Anyone who truly did have a perfect childhood... would never grow up. Although we are all scarred by our childhoods, we are, however, scarred to very different degrees. You might review your childhood in detail and find nothing worse than an offhand cruel comment one of your parents made one afternoon when they were a little drunk and something had gone sour in their life. But I assure you, if you will look honestly, you will find something.
  - tripzilch 14y ago
    > But I assure you, if you will look honestly, you will find something. Following the same reasoning, my horoscope is true. I'm not sure if I disagree with you entirely, but your argument is silly. If you look hard enough, you can find evidence for anything to some degree. It's a type of confirmation bias, in fact. In my opinion it's most useful to look not at the degree of scarring, but the degree of how much childhood events affect a person later in life. Unfortunately, that makes the whole argument rather circular.
  - sopooneo 14y ago
    You could ask me the same question in reverse, but why are you so sure that everyone bears scars from childhood? Is it that it's been the case with everyone you've met? It certainly has been the case with many people I've met.

by CWIZO 14y ago

manmal 14y ago

Exactly, wanted to post just that. The "trick" to say those affirmations to yourself in the mirror is her way of improving their effectiveness. I love her books, and her words go into the heart. A must read for people not loving their life as it is. ADDED: I always had the feel that Swombat is into this kind of thing, cool that he finally writes about thought-hacking and affirmations.

wpietri 14y ago

I'm unfamiliar with that work, and I'm not much of an affirmations person. But the victims of victims thing makes a ton of sense to me now that I'm old enough to have watched kids grow up. Kids are incredible sponges early in life. They soak up so much. In the store I see parents saying things to their kids and think, "Wow, that's an expensive therapy bill in the making." Personally, I don't worry too much about remembering the particular interactions in my past. I treat it more as a reverse engineering problem. Given my behavior X, in what circumstances could that have been adaptive?

sopooneo 14y ago

One thing I am surprised by with these types of theories is the lack of awareness that some people have happy childhoods with parents who don't scar them in any way. It's like it's taken as a given that a legacy of sadness runs through every family.

ScottBurson 14y ago
> some people have happy childhoods with parents who don't scar them in any way Actually, they don't. All families are dysfunctional; there is no perfect childhood. Everyone is scarred. This is, ironically, a wonderful thing! Anyone who truly did have a perfect childhood... would never grow up. Although we are all scarred by our childhoods, we are, however, scarred to very different degrees. You might review your childhood in detail and find nothing worse than an offhand cruel comment one of your parents made one afternoon when they were a little drunk and something had gone sour in their life. But I assure you, if you will look honestly, you will find something.
- tripzilch 14y ago
  > But I assure you, if you will look honestly, you will find something. Following the same reasoning, my horoscope is true. I'm not sure if I disagree with you entirely, but your argument is silly. If you look hard enough, you can find evidence for anything to some degree. It's a type of confirmation bias, in fact. In my opinion it's most useful to look not at the degree of scarring, but the degree of how much childhood events affect a person later in life. Unfortunately, that makes the whole argument rather circular.
- sopooneo 14y ago
  You could ask me the same question in reverse, but why are you so sure that everyone bears scars from childhood? Is it that it's been the case with everyone you've met? It certainly has been the case with many people I've met.