6 ms·

Friendship Begins at Home

166 points by herbertl 1y ago

HippyTed 1y ago
To friendship and love of others I say, you cannot sell what you don't have. You can do it for a while but, the long lasting stuff, you need that personal foundation. Easily said but difficult to do for many. It requires a level of self awareness and an acknowledgement of your strengths and weaknesses and how they impact yourself and others. But like a doctor, the first step to a cure is a correct diagnosis. Something something Jungian shadow work or something.
- aspenmayer 1y ago
  > To friendship and love of others I say, you cannot sell what you don't have. I love this formulation and will add it to my collection of aphorisms. I myself like a similar phrasing: one cannot pour from an empty cup.
- optiot 1y ago
  That 'doing it for a while' part is one reason I don't really like the "only as well as you love yourself" truism. One can absolutely care deeply for others without caring much for themself, at least to start. But to your point, unless you can develop [/an awareness of the] strengths that you bring to a relationship, fears of being a burden, failing, or taking too much will put a steady drain on it. I think the biggest thing that the "self-love prerequisite" idea misses and that the article sort of indirectly gets at is that this feeling of social self-efficacy is something most (all?) people learn through successful relationships with others - sometimes in our upbringing, sometimes not. I don't think it's unnatural at all for others' love of us to outpace our own just a little.
- makeitdouble 1y ago
  > you cannot sell what you don't have. Except you can, you can be a middle layer. I'm not just nitpicking on the analogy failing at the first degree, you can love someone much more than you love yourself, and the nature of what you bring to them doesn't need to be how you deal with yourself. People raising kids in particular are supporting a level of self abuse that flies in the face of the analogy. They also understand that they need to take care of themselves, physically and mentally, to even be there to help their kid when needed. But asking them to treat themselves like they treat their kid just doesn't work in any practical way.
  - em-bee 1y ago
    treat themselves like they treat their kid just doesn't work in any practical way how do you figure that? or, what exactly do you mean here? i don't exactly treat my kids the way i treat myself, but that's because we have different needs. but i most certainly don't treat my kids worse or better than myself. you also say: they also understand that they need to take care of themselves, physically and mentally, to even be there to help their kid when needed exactly, so where is the self-abuse?
    - makeitdouble 1y ago
      As a parent the physical/mental efforts and money I'm spending raising a kid aren't reciprocal to anything I'm doing for myself. We're at a stage we can sleep, don't deal with piss poop everyday, and only focus on higher issues like education and health, but it's still a lot. And that's fine, that's an arrangement I'm choosing, and that's what makes the most sense. We're also getting something back emotionally, but I'd never expect for the whole thing to be balanced, and it would be crazy to expect as much from my kid as we're pouring into it. T I don't know how it works for you, that's just not what raising kids is in our society today. We'd have to get back to sending kids to work 8h a day if we stick to the simplistic "treat others like you treat yourself" view of the world. And I think more generally, that's not how caring for loved ones work. You can't be doing mental bookkeeping, the whole concept is just weird. > self abuse If we remove all the emotion and human aspects of it, sleeping a total of 4h in 3 days to keep an ill small human alive is self abuse.
      - em-bee 1y ago
        i don't think we are fundamentally disagreeing, but i do see a few things differently. As a parent the physical/mental efforts and money I'm spending raising a kid aren't reciprocal to anything I'm doing for myself. why? i mean, i agree they aren't equal, but i do for my kids what they need, and for myself what i need. so i consider it fair, neither to much, nor to little. I'd never expect for the whole thing to be balanced my definition of balanced is that everyone gets what they need. so yeah, it's absolutely balanced for me. or at least i try to make it balanced. it would be crazy to expect as much from my kid as we're pouring into it strongly disagree on that point, however, what i expect from my kids is what they do in the future. my dad stopped pouring anything into me when i moved out of the house. simply because i moved far away and we had little contact. which was fine. i now spend a lifetime giving to others what i learned from my dad. i expect my kids to do the same. for me it's the whole point of raising them. for them to go out and pay things forward. We'd have to get back to sending kids to work 8h a day if we stick to the simplistic "treat others like you treat yourself" view of the world. this doesn't make any sense to me at all. but then, i am a freelancer, and i work on what i want, when i want. i don't work 8hrs a day either. so maybe i am an exception here, and i treat myself better than the average person? but even with a full-time job i don't think i would feel different. also, we are sending kids to school. that's their "job" and it's just just as hard. including homework some kids work more than their parents. mental bookkeeping i don't do bookkeeping. all i am doing is making sure that i am well, and my family is well too. sleeping a total of 4h in 3 days to keep an ill small human alive is self abuse disagree calling that abuse. it's a sacrifice. but when that happens i'd take time off work, including a few days afterwards to recover. self-abuse implies that i should not do it. instead i make sure i get enough sleep on normal days. i am 50, and i am still able to pull the occasional all-nighter. not regularly, but i can if i have to.
jmathai 1y ago
Introspection and self awareness are prerequisites to love yourself. Or, at least, to become someone you can love. Loving yourself means you have acknowledged your weaknesses. Whether or not you strengthen them, it enables you to empathize with others as their own weaknesses manifest. The world becomes much more cozy once you realize others are not much different than you.
- gsf_emergency_4 1y ago
  Friending yourself means that you don't have to rely on others to enjoy jokes at your own expense! (Edited for clarity)
  - BLKNSLVR 1y ago
    Knowing yourself to know, and forgive / accept, who and what you are. Allows you to appreciate the perceptiveness of others when they're correct. Also, if you do not know yourself (and especially if you cannot forgive yourself) you're going to struggle to deal with your own children. My kids reflect me back at myself in what were frustrating ways, until I realised it was me and my influence, and it became massively endearing. Although I may be too forgiving of myself (but in amongst that I do still have 'the voices of discontent' but the longer I live the more their sentiment is proven wrong).
    - gsf_emergency_4 1y ago
      Kids are a great mirror --sometimes their unforgiveness (beyond mere unforgivingness/mercilessness :) is a spur to get better.. Are some voices of discontent not simply expressing a desire to make things better for others? Those shouldn't be dismissed so readily
- derektank 1y ago
  I'll be honest, I can't say that awareness of my weaknesses has in any way made it easier to love myself. If anything, the constant gnawing awareness of the many qualities I lack makes it harder.
65 1y ago
I don't think it's possible to "love yourself" if you want to word it like that. Understand yourself? Maybe. Accept yourself? Sure. But love as a concept is shared.
- TheDong 1y ago
  Love is a reasonably broad english word. "I love eating delicious food" is a totally sensible sentence with involves only the self and an inanimate object, and arguably only the self because it is about your own enjoyment and actions more so than the food itself. "I love computers", etc etc. Love is broad, it can be shared, it can be unrequited, it can be with an inanimate object or with an abstract concept. The object can certainly be the self.
- fergie 1y ago
  I’ve always struggled with this concept too. Respect yourself. Be kind to yourself. But _loving_ youself sounds kind of narcissistic to me (but yes, I get that this is probably a question of semantics and/or my working class catholic upbringing)
  - Theodores 1y ago
    Me too. Maybe it is a British cultural difference, however, 'loving oneself' and the language of 'self love' definitely makes me cringe. Hence, I prefer to think of 'not hating oneself' as the area to improve on. From time to time I do hate myself. This can be from letting someone down or from an accidental misunderstanding. This is when I truly loathe myself and only the passage of time will help me move on from 'shameful behaviour', but that self-hate will never fully go away. In these situations, any talk of 'self love' really won't help. What does help is to have friends to confide in, and sometimes they provide some perspective that is helpful. Maybe they have also upset the same person and can reassure me that I meant no harm.
aantix 1y ago
I've been pretty harsh on myself over the years. I started carrying around a photo of myself as a kid. I'm sitting against a wall, by a pillar, at our state capital. My eyes are shut. I was kind of a shy kid. When I start to get frustrated and talk to myself in that short, abrasive, condescending tone, I think of that photo and of myself, as still that kid. It helps me to be more compassionate towards myself in those moments. I'm still that shy kid trying to make sense of the world. I'm 47.
- jama211 1y ago
  Thank you for sharing this, really interesting!
- AndrewKemendo 1y ago
  I did the same at 39 and was helpful for some major healing. It’s surprisingly common, at least in my circles, over the last few years.
- BLKNSLVR 1y ago
  I just realised, from writing a comment below in the thread, that at 47 (which roughly approximates my age as well) that the internal talk is increasingly provably false. the voice is a shock jock, click bait. All headline, no research, no lede.
  - gsf_emergency_4 1y ago
    True. Rubber ducks for self-debugging are uh mostly overrated. A trained therapist--- sometimes free-of-charge-- works for most issues where some would rubber duck (reminder to self)
    - EbEsacAig 1y ago
      I must agree. That you can prove the inner voice false does not help in the least. It does not listen to reason, and it does not shut up. It needs to be addressed from a completely different angle.
  - 1y ago
mumber_typhoon 1y ago
Warning: self harm, su**de. As someone who's had to do extensive work on myself to survive I can relate to a lot of things said here. I have gone through a lot of material on psychology and spend a lot of time thinking myself when I read or go through the material. This was after 3 years of medication and 20 years of suffering and reaching the point of wanting badly to end my life due to multiple factors growing up. What I would suggest if you wanted to start working on yourself building healthier relationships with yourself and others: First is find a suitable therapist. Shop for a therapist like you shop for clothes. Do a session or two and see what you feel. What you need depends on what you are going through. Depression panic anxiety marriage health etc. But don't continue therapy where you don't feel good. There wont be a perfect fit but 'good enough' is someone you can talk to and is compassionate and helps you to do well. They will also assign small homework and that is important. The right therapist will be on your team and slowly nudge you in the right direction (though with your knowledge not sneakily). This builds trust. Second would be start working on your body. Your body is just as important as your mind. And the two are very interlinked. Yoga, Mindfulness, being more present (ditch your phones and social media accounts), exercise, food, etc. all contribute to your mental wellbeing which will help you create a good relationship with yourself. Once you give the body the love it needs, it will give it back to you. Third would be to do some reading on mental health and books by psychologists. The thing is you will get lot of insights on your own life reading all that. But be careful too, it might bring up intense memories (like trauma) that can be dangerous. So go slow. Peter Levine, Gabor Mate, Bessel van Der Kolk, Gottman, Richard Shwartz, David Burns, beane Browne etc. Such authors are actively doing work on the cognitive side of things. Some have extreme theories so look for things that apply to you. I will admit that I was skeptical of the whole 'change your thoughts and things will change' and to some extent I still think that it's not the whole story. But you have to do the self work and your mind is a big part of it. I am very far from building healthy relationships in my life but I think I am having a good relationship with myself lately. I may have gone a few notches down in depression and things have improved. There is a lot more to share tbh on this but these things are something I did in the last two years that seem to have helped.
- vasco 1y ago
  When I read su**de my brain read suicide, so you still put the word in my mind, what's your point doing that? In fact I spent more time thinking and parsing the word suicide because of the asterisks.
makeitdouble 1y ago
On the core of the piece > It is commonly, and truly, said that you can only love someone as well as you love yourself. > I’ve worked with patients [...] I wish it was clear from the start that they're looking at it through a pathological lens. The advice is worded as some generic fortune cookie wisdom, and I personally think that's a pretty big leap. In general people should care about themselves and understand their impact on others. But that doesn't need to be "love", and the author seems aware of it, as the nitty gritty parts he describes are more varied than some single umbrella approach. The "love yourself" meme has been used and abused for so long, I personally found it grating and inadequate for the people we wish to actually help. I'd wish we retire it.
- vasco 1y ago
  Having spent many years very close to people with shit childhoods that deal with depression and other issues, I'd say one of the biggest hurdles was indeed being able to create a positive self image of themselves. There's some people that think "they are depressive" the same way some people think "they have a penchant for being late to things". All these negative self images just perpetuate behaviors and trains of thought that go nowhere positive. There's a lot of regular people that hear that and think that's justification to being narcissistic selfish assholes, but that's like all advice, you should first see if it applies to you.
  - makeitdouble 1y ago
    > depression I see depression as specific states that requires different handling. The analogy is limited, but if you break your arm you'll heal it in different ways than if you're just tired. For people not reaching critical states, creating a positive image of one self doesn't need to come from within. As the article points out, one can start by interacting with others, and getting enough positivity from it to also change self-perception or at least self management. To borrow another meme, "believe in me that believes in you" effectively works as well.
- mmooss 1y ago
  > In general people should care about themselves and understand their impact on others. But that doesn't need to be "love" I agree that anything can become overused cliche. Still, I think the parent comment is like saying, 'people need sustenance but that doesn't need to be water'. There is nothing more essential. People need love like we need water. We are social organisms, living in groups; we are not like bears who live alone. The lack of love makes us ill and drives us to madness. We've seek, with everything we have, to love and be loved; you can see it in love between parent and child, between family, friends, and romantic partners. These things are universal to humanity - you can find them in every culture, and every culture's stories. Evolution, survival of the fittest, etc. has resulted in that. And it starts with love of self; how could you love someone else, or be comfortable with them loving you, if you didn't think you were worth love. I've never heard of anyone who seriously studies such things say otherwise; I'd be interested in any references to such people.
roncesvalles 1y ago
The problem is this: if you finally just accept yourself for who you are (because that's basically what love means), do you then stop growing?
- andruby 1y ago
  I don’t think so. You can accept yourself and be content/happy and still want to learn new skills, try new hobbies, and grow.
  - roncesvalles 1y ago
    I feel like all the truly transformative growth, those periods when you sprint from a nobody to the cutting edge, or start from a blank sheet and build a work of genius the likes that humanity has never seen, the manic energy that drives this, it always comes from hate. A hate for the self (wanting to prove something to yourself) or a hate for others (wanting to prove something to others), (which may really be the same thing; you're trying to invalidate your self-criticism and the perceived criticism of others by proving that you're better at something than most anyone else in the world). Mentally healthy people become mailmen.
    - _def 1y ago
      What you describe as "hate" can work much more efficient when coming from a somewhat loving competitiveness, I think.
      - stodor89 1y ago
        Exactly. When people talk of "hatred" in such context, the nature of the feeling they describe has very little in common with the kind of feelings I've had at some points. If you think you're worth growing, and improving, and rebuilding, isn't "hate" way too strong of a word?
        roncesvalles 1y ago
jagrsw 1y ago
Skilled essay, but not an argument. Opens with "As Jung notes" as an appeal to authority, then more name-drops. Misses clear definitions (what counts as "friendship with self"?) and the mechanism (how X->Y). Anecdotes/quotes != proofs. IOW, prestige != proof. Two quick checks 1) strip the names - does the reasoning still stand? 2) Flip to counterexamples - does the thesis survive? We all know people who are hard on themselves but deeply loving to others. Nice essay but treat it as a opinion to test, not a truth to inherit. The thread reads as if the case were already proven.
- Foreignborn 1y ago
  it at least seems like it has a modicum of human thought, whereas this GPT drivel does not.
- raddan 1y ago
  I usually treat “think pieces” like these as mere mental stimulation. It’s pretty difficult to say anything definitive about how everyone should live or how everyone should think, but I don’t think that means we ourselves should not reflect on those things. After all, we live and think, and why not try to do those things better?
TheAlchemist 1y ago
Very good read. Took me almost 40 years to understand this. Better late than never !
scrollop 1y ago
Did you notice the cookie service this site (and many others) use? This service can have cookies switched off, though "legitimate interest" is left on. "Legitimate interest" sounds innocent, yet it is not. https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/lawful-basis/a-guide-to-lawful-basis/legitimate-interests/?q=appropriate+policy https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-re... If you scroll down the dilog box for this service you will find a link to "vendor preferences". Click this, and you will find dozens of companies, with many having "legitimate interest" switched on. I find this deceptive (hiding this, essentially, and also using "legitimate interest". If I really want to read what the site says I laboriously click no to legitimate interest, though usually I just close the page.
anal_reactor 1y ago
It's a nice reminder that the art of producing meaningless slop with way more style than substance has existed for ages, and it wasn't invented by LLMs.
theusus 1y ago
Everyone tells what but not how. From years of healing I have learned that picking up random quotes or texts from internet won’t help at all. You should read or go to a professional. Anger,Sadness, Misery cannot just go away when you say you would. It takes a change in mindset, knowledge, and convincing.
miesman 1y ago
“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.” — Carl Jung
socrateswasone 1y ago
[dead]
unrealp 1y ago
This one I found useful - "Stop trusting your thoughts. Why not? Havent they failed you over and over and over?" - Gangaji
cbdevidal 1y ago
<Deleted comment>

166 points by herbertl 1y ago

To friendship and love of others I say, you cannot sell what you don't have. You can do it for a while but, the long lasting stuff, you need that personal foundation. Easily said but difficult to do for many. It requires a level of self awareness and an acknowledgement of your strengths and weaknesses and how they impact yourself and others. But like a doctor, the first step to a cure is a correct diagnosis. Something something Jungian shadow work or something.

aspenmayer 1y ago
> To friendship and love of others I say, you cannot sell what you don't have. I love this formulation and will add it to my collection of aphorisms. I myself like a similar phrasing: one cannot pour from an empty cup.
optiot 1y ago
That 'doing it for a while' part is one reason I don't really like the "only as well as you love yourself" truism. One can absolutely care deeply for others without caring much for themself, at least to start. But to your point, unless you can develop [/an awareness of the] strengths that you bring to a relationship, fears of being a burden, failing, or taking too much will put a steady drain on it. I think the biggest thing that the "self-love prerequisite" idea misses and that the article sort of indirectly gets at is that this feeling of social self-efficacy is something most (all?) people learn through successful relationships with others - sometimes in our upbringing, sometimes not. I don't think it's unnatural at all for others' love of us to outpace our own just a little.
makeitdouble 1y ago
> you cannot sell what you don't have. Except you can, you can be a middle layer. I'm not just nitpicking on the analogy failing at the first degree, you can love someone much more than you love yourself, and the nature of what you bring to them doesn't need to be how you deal with yourself. People raising kids in particular are supporting a level of self abuse that flies in the face of the analogy. They also understand that they need to take care of themselves, physically and mentally, to even be there to help their kid when needed. But asking them to treat themselves like they treat their kid just doesn't work in any practical way.
- em-bee 1y ago
  treat themselves like they treat their kid just doesn't work in any practical way how do you figure that? or, what exactly do you mean here? i don't exactly treat my kids the way i treat myself, but that's because we have different needs. but i most certainly don't treat my kids worse or better than myself. you also say: they also understand that they need to take care of themselves, physically and mentally, to even be there to help their kid when needed exactly, so where is the self-abuse?
  - makeitdouble 1y ago
    As a parent the physical/mental efforts and money I'm spending raising a kid aren't reciprocal to anything I'm doing for myself. We're at a stage we can sleep, don't deal with piss poop everyday, and only focus on higher issues like education and health, but it's still a lot. And that's fine, that's an arrangement I'm choosing, and that's what makes the most sense. We're also getting something back emotionally, but I'd never expect for the whole thing to be balanced, and it would be crazy to expect as much from my kid as we're pouring into it. T I don't know how it works for you, that's just not what raising kids is in our society today. We'd have to get back to sending kids to work 8h a day if we stick to the simplistic "treat others like you treat yourself" view of the world. And I think more generally, that's not how caring for loved ones work. You can't be doing mental bookkeeping, the whole concept is just weird. > self abuse If we remove all the emotion and human aspects of it, sleeping a total of 4h in 3 days to keep an ill small human alive is self abuse.
    - em-bee 1y ago
      i don't think we are fundamentally disagreeing, but i do see a few things differently. As a parent the physical/mental efforts and money I'm spending raising a kid aren't reciprocal to anything I'm doing for myself. why? i mean, i agree they aren't equal, but i do for my kids what they need, and for myself what i need. so i consider it fair, neither to much, nor to little. I'd never expect for the whole thing to be balanced my definition of balanced is that everyone gets what they need. so yeah, it's absolutely balanced for me. or at least i try to make it balanced. it would be crazy to expect as much from my kid as we're pouring into it strongly disagree on that point, however, what i expect from my kids is what they do in the future. my dad stopped pouring anything into me when i moved out of the house. simply because i moved far away and we had little contact. which was fine. i now spend a lifetime giving to others what i learned from my dad. i expect my kids to do the same. for me it's the whole point of raising them. for them to go out and pay things forward. We'd have to get back to sending kids to work 8h a day if we stick to the simplistic "treat others like you treat yourself" view of the world. this doesn't make any sense to me at all. but then, i am a freelancer, and i work on what i want, when i want. i don't work 8hrs a day either. so maybe i am an exception here, and i treat myself better than the average person? but even with a full-time job i don't think i would feel different. also, we are sending kids to school. that's their "job" and it's just just as hard. including homework some kids work more than their parents. mental bookkeeping i don't do bookkeeping. all i am doing is making sure that i am well, and my family is well too. sleeping a total of 4h in 3 days to keep an ill small human alive is self abuse disagree calling that abuse. it's a sacrifice. but when that happens i'd take time off work, including a few days afterwards to recover. self-abuse implies that i should not do it. instead i make sure i get enough sleep on normal days. i am 50, and i am still able to pull the occasional all-nighter. not regularly, but i can if i have to.

jmathai 1y ago

Introspection and self awareness are prerequisites to love yourself. Or, at least, to become someone you can love. Loving yourself means you have acknowledged your weaknesses. Whether or not you strengthen them, it enables you to empathize with others as their own weaknesses manifest. The world becomes much more cozy once you realize others are not much different than you.

gsf_emergency_4 1y ago
Friending yourself means that you don't have to rely on others to enjoy jokes at your own expense! (Edited for clarity)
- BLKNSLVR 1y ago
  Knowing yourself to know, and forgive / accept, who and what you are. Allows you to appreciate the perceptiveness of others when they're correct. Also, if you do not know yourself (and especially if you cannot forgive yourself) you're going to struggle to deal with your own children. My kids reflect me back at myself in what were frustrating ways, until I realised it was me and my influence, and it became massively endearing. Although I may be too forgiving of myself (but in amongst that I do still have 'the voices of discontent' but the longer I live the more their sentiment is proven wrong).
  - gsf_emergency_4 1y ago
    Kids are a great mirror --sometimes their unforgiveness (beyond mere unforgivingness/mercilessness :) is a spur to get better.. Are some voices of discontent not simply expressing a desire to make things better for others? Those shouldn't be dismissed so readily
derektank 1y ago
I'll be honest, I can't say that awareness of my weaknesses has in any way made it easier to love myself. If anything, the constant gnawing awareness of the many qualities I lack makes it harder.

65 1y ago

I don't think it's possible to "love yourself" if you want to word it like that. Understand yourself? Maybe. Accept yourself? Sure. But love as a concept is shared.

TheDong 1y ago
Love is a reasonably broad english word. "I love eating delicious food" is a totally sensible sentence with involves only the self and an inanimate object, and arguably only the self because it is about your own enjoyment and actions more so than the food itself. "I love computers", etc etc. Love is broad, it can be shared, it can be unrequited, it can be with an inanimate object or with an abstract concept. The object can certainly be the self.
fergie 1y ago
I’ve always struggled with this concept too. Respect yourself. Be kind to yourself. But _loving_ youself sounds kind of narcissistic to me (but yes, I get that this is probably a question of semantics and/or my working class catholic upbringing)
- Theodores 1y ago
  Me too. Maybe it is a British cultural difference, however, 'loving oneself' and the language of 'self love' definitely makes me cringe. Hence, I prefer to think of 'not hating oneself' as the area to improve on. From time to time I do hate myself. This can be from letting someone down or from an accidental misunderstanding. This is when I truly loathe myself and only the passage of time will help me move on from 'shameful behaviour', but that self-hate will never fully go away. In these situations, any talk of 'self love' really won't help. What does help is to have friends to confide in, and sometimes they provide some perspective that is helpful. Maybe they have also upset the same person and can reassure me that I meant no harm.

aantix 1y ago

I've been pretty harsh on myself over the years. I started carrying around a photo of myself as a kid. I'm sitting against a wall, by a pillar, at our state capital. My eyes are shut. I was kind of a shy kid. When I start to get frustrated and talk to myself in that short, abrasive, condescending tone, I think of that photo and of myself, as still that kid. It helps me to be more compassionate towards myself in those moments. I'm still that shy kid trying to make sense of the world. I'm 47.

jama211 1y ago
Thank you for sharing this, really interesting!
AndrewKemendo 1y ago
I did the same at 39 and was helpful for some major healing. It’s surprisingly common, at least in my circles, over the last few years.
BLKNSLVR 1y ago
I just realised, from writing a comment below in the thread, that at 47 (which roughly approximates my age as well) that the internal talk is increasingly provably false. the voice is a shock jock, click bait. All headline, no research, no lede.
- gsf_emergency_4 1y ago
  True. Rubber ducks for self-debugging are uh mostly overrated. A trained therapist--- sometimes free-of-charge-- works for most issues where some would rubber duck (reminder to self)
  - EbEsacAig 1y ago
    I must agree. That you can prove the inner voice false does not help in the least. It does not listen to reason, and it does not shut up. It needs to be addressed from a completely different angle.
- 1y ago

mumber_typhoon 1y ago

Warning: self harm, su**de. As someone who's had to do extensive work on myself to survive I can relate to a lot of things said here. I have gone through a lot of material on psychology and spend a lot of time thinking myself when I read or go through the material. This was after 3 years of medication and 20 years of suffering and reaching the point of wanting badly to end my life due to multiple factors growing up. What I would suggest if you wanted to start working on yourself building healthier relationships with yourself and others: First is find a suitable therapist. Shop for a therapist like you shop for clothes. Do a session or two and see what you feel. What you need depends on what you are going through. Depression panic anxiety marriage health etc. But don't continue therapy where you don't feel good. There wont be a perfect fit but 'good enough' is someone you can talk to and is compassionate and helps you to do well. They will also assign small homework and that is important. The right therapist will be on your team and slowly nudge you in the right direction (though with your knowledge not sneakily). This builds trust. Second would be start working on your body. Your body is just as important as your mind. And the two are very interlinked. Yoga, Mindfulness, being more present (ditch your phones and social media accounts), exercise, food, etc. all contribute to your mental wellbeing which will help you create a good relationship with yourself. Once you give the body the love it needs, it will give it back to you. Third would be to do some reading on mental health and books by psychologists. The thing is you will get lot of insights on your own life reading all that. But be careful too, it might bring up intense memories (like trauma) that can be dangerous. So go slow. Peter Levine, Gabor Mate, Bessel van Der Kolk, Gottman, Richard Shwartz, David Burns, beane Browne etc. Such authors are actively doing work on the cognitive side of things. Some have extreme theories so look for things that apply to you. I will admit that I was skeptical of the whole 'change your thoughts and things will change' and to some extent I still think that it's not the whole story. But you have to do the self work and your mind is a big part of it. I am very far from building healthy relationships in my life but I think I am having a good relationship with myself lately. I may have gone a few notches down in depression and things have improved. There is a lot more to share tbh on this but these things are something I did in the last two years that seem to have helped.

vasco 1y ago
When I read su**de my brain read suicide, so you still put the word in my mind, what's your point doing that? In fact I spent more time thinking and parsing the word suicide because of the asterisks.

makeitdouble 1y ago

On the core of the piece > It is commonly, and truly, said that you can only love someone as well as you love yourself. > I’ve worked with patients [...] I wish it was clear from the start that they're looking at it through a pathological lens. The advice is worded as some generic fortune cookie wisdom, and I personally think that's a pretty big leap. In general people should care about themselves and understand their impact on others. But that doesn't need to be "love", and the author seems aware of it, as the nitty gritty parts he describes are more varied than some single umbrella approach. The "love yourself" meme has been used and abused for so long, I personally found it grating and inadequate for the people we wish to actually help. I'd wish we retire it.

vasco 1y ago
Having spent many years very close to people with shit childhoods that deal with depression and other issues, I'd say one of the biggest hurdles was indeed being able to create a positive self image of themselves. There's some people that think "they are depressive" the same way some people think "they have a penchant for being late to things". All these negative self images just perpetuate behaviors and trains of thought that go nowhere positive. There's a lot of regular people that hear that and think that's justification to being narcissistic selfish assholes, but that's like all advice, you should first see if it applies to you.
- makeitdouble 1y ago
  > depression I see depression as specific states that requires different handling. The analogy is limited, but if you break your arm you'll heal it in different ways than if you're just tired. For people not reaching critical states, creating a positive image of one self doesn't need to come from within. As the article points out, one can start by interacting with others, and getting enough positivity from it to also change self-perception or at least self management. To borrow another meme, "believe in me that believes in you" effectively works as well.
mmooss 1y ago
> In general people should care about themselves and understand their impact on others. But that doesn't need to be "love" I agree that anything can become overused cliche. Still, I think the parent comment is like saying, 'people need sustenance but that doesn't need to be water'. There is nothing more essential. People need love like we need water. We are social organisms, living in groups; we are not like bears who live alone. The lack of love makes us ill and drives us to madness. We've seek, with everything we have, to love and be loved; you can see it in love between parent and child, between family, friends, and romantic partners. These things are universal to humanity - you can find them in every culture, and every culture's stories. Evolution, survival of the fittest, etc. has resulted in that. And it starts with love of self; how could you love someone else, or be comfortable with them loving you, if you didn't think you were worth love. I've never heard of anyone who seriously studies such things say otherwise; I'd be interested in any references to such people.

roncesvalles 1y ago

The problem is this: if you finally just accept yourself for who you are (because that's basically what love means), do you then stop growing?

andruby 1y ago
I don’t think so. You can accept yourself and be content/happy and still want to learn new skills, try new hobbies, and grow.
- roncesvalles 1y ago
  I feel like all the truly transformative growth, those periods when you sprint from a nobody to the cutting edge, or start from a blank sheet and build a work of genius the likes that humanity has never seen, the manic energy that drives this, it always comes from hate. A hate for the self (wanting to prove something to yourself) or a hate for others (wanting to prove something to others), (which may really be the same thing; you're trying to invalidate your self-criticism and the perceived criticism of others by proving that you're better at something than most anyone else in the world). Mentally healthy people become mailmen.
  - _def 1y ago
    What you describe as "hate" can work much more efficient when coming from a somewhat loving competitiveness, I think.
    - stodor89 1y ago
      Exactly. When people talk of "hatred" in such context, the nature of the feeling they describe has very little in common with the kind of feelings I've had at some points. If you think you're worth growing, and improving, and rebuilding, isn't "hate" way too strong of a word?
      - roncesvalles 1y ago

jagrsw 1y ago

Skilled essay, but not an argument. Opens with "As Jung notes" as an appeal to authority, then more name-drops. Misses clear definitions (what counts as "friendship with self"?) and the mechanism (how X->Y). Anecdotes/quotes != proofs. IOW, prestige != proof. Two quick checks 1) strip the names - does the reasoning still stand? 2) Flip to counterexamples - does the thesis survive? We all know people who are hard on themselves but deeply loving to others. Nice essay but treat it as a opinion to test, not a truth to inherit. The thread reads as if the case were already proven.

Foreignborn 1y ago
it at least seems like it has a modicum of human thought, whereas this GPT drivel does not.
raddan 1y ago
I usually treat “think pieces” like these as mere mental stimulation. It’s pretty difficult to say anything definitive about how everyone should live or how everyone should think, but I don’t think that means we ourselves should not reflect on those things. After all, we live and think, and why not try to do those things better?

TheAlchemist 1y ago

Very good read. Took me almost 40 years to understand this. Better late than never !

scrollop 1y ago

Did you notice the cookie service this site (and many others) use? This service can have cookies switched off, though "legitimate interest" is left on. "Legitimate interest" sounds innocent, yet it is not. https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/lawful-basis/a-guide-to-lawful-basis/legitimate-interests/?q=appropriate+policy https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-re... If you scroll down the dilog box for this service you will find a link to "vendor preferences". Click this, and you will find dozens of companies, with many having "legitimate interest" switched on. I find this deceptive (hiding this, essentially, and also using "legitimate interest". If I really want to read what the site says I laboriously click no to legitimate interest, though usually I just close the page.

anal_reactor 1y ago

It's a nice reminder that the art of producing meaningless slop with way more style than substance has existed for ages, and it wasn't invented by LLMs.

theusus 1y ago

Everyone tells what but not how. From years of healing I have learned that picking up random quotes or texts from internet won’t help at all. You should read or go to a professional. Anger,Sadness, Misery cannot just go away when you say you would. It takes a change in mindset, knowledge, and convincing.

miesman 1y ago

“The meeting of two personalities is like the contact of two chemical substances: if there is any reaction, both are transformed.” — Carl Jung

socrateswasone 1y ago

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unrealp 1y ago

This one I found useful - "Stop trusting your thoughts. Why not? Havent they failed you over and over and over?" - Gangaji

cbdevidal 1y ago