Day 12 On personality traits:

[jarditti]

Today we're supposed to write about a personality trait that might be contributing to TMS and how it affects us. I'm not sure exactly how to call this trait, but I'm naming it the "I'll Do It" person. If no one mobilizes or takes initiative, I'm always, always the one stepping up. Then the thoughts come:
- What does everybody want or feel or need here that I need to consider?
- How are they judging me as I make the decision for the group?
- Is this the right decision, or are there other options or comparable choices?
This affects me because I can't simply make decisions. I have to consider, or guess, more likely, what everyone's desires and feelings are. Then I internalize stress because I'm worried that if I get it wrong, I'll be judged, and it feels like a feedback loop for being hard on myself.
I think this is another version of overextending myself, and in some ways it's another version of overextending my family. It affects me because it makes it harder for me to focus and be present in the moment as well. I'm not sure where that desire to overextend and commit to too many things comes from. Perhaps it's a shield or a cover where I don't want to look internally. I'd rather be focused on supporting lots of different people and doing lots of different things as distractions. I do think that always volunteering and taking initiative and overextending myself has been a distraction from being at peace internally. In some ways, it's a form of anxiety I have. I've talked about how my mom does this. We both put on the same "cape" of being the emotional, empathetic, and outreaching people in our family that take care of others and make things happen.

It feels exhausting. Even now, as I try to be compassionate to myself, my mind spins thinking about how I could be reaching out to family members or checking in on friends, or coordinating social events with peers. It's also hard to think about this because my wife and I are very social people. We have a fear of letting people down. I also have a fear of letting her down sometimes too. I need to catch myself in these moments and remind myself that I am okay and that the life I built and the family I have are okay. I need to be proud of my accomplishments and strive to find more inner peace so that I can actually enjoy the things right in front of me.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

I'm not sure where that desire to overextend and commit to too many things comes from.

I think this is all a great reflection - one idea and my first thought was is an inability for you to let others make decisions and be taken care of in a sense because of a past experience of being let down? Over-responsibility can be a trauma response as if to say "I've been let down so many times by others, so if I take full control now and make every decision then no one can let me down ever again". Your own fear of letting people down could be born out of your own negative experience with being let down. If you want to stop people pleasing and you want to let go of the burden, then you might have to expose yourself to this fear.

 

[jarditti]

I think this is all a great reflection - one idea and my first thought was is an inability for you to let others make decisions and be taken care of in a sense because of a past experience of being let down? Over-responsibility can be a trauma response as if to say "I've been let down so many times by others, so if I take full control now and make every decision then no one can let me down ever again". Your own fear of letting people down could be born out of your own negative experience with being let down. If you want to stop people pleasing and you want to let go of the burden, then you might have to expose yourself to this fear.

Great comment - could the fear of being let down be a response or counter to me being hard on myself? When I've failed in the past or others have failed me, I'm blaming and pointing fingers and not getting over it (whether it's me or someone else). Nothing comes to mind (yet) of being let down in my life in a significant way.

 

[Adam Coloretti (coach)]

Great comment - could the fear of being let down be a response or counter to me being hard on myself? When I've failed in the past or others have failed me, I'm blaming and pointing fingers and not getting over it (whether it's me or someone else). Nothing comes to mind (yet) of being let down in my life in a significant way.

I think definitely! Fearing the self-blame (if you were to be let down) could cause you to avoid being helped. Often too, wanting to blame and point fingers at others is often a defence mechanism in and of itself to prevent self-blame. I know that when I think I'm partially to blame or have guilt, I am far more interested in blaming (it's a natural tendency I think to avoid having to feel guilt - especially for those who feel guilt really strongly and have strong beliefs of right and wrong). Compare that, for example, to if it's 100% someone else's fault, you won't be as interested in assigning blame because you are simply comfortable in knowing that it isn't your fault. Now you might have to ram the point home if someone falsely believes it is your fault (for practical reasons, like at work where it would be detrimental if the boss thought you made a mistake when you didn't), but here there's no internal blame/guilt to assuage. Hopefully that makes sense, so the key is to blame yourself less (not only that, but also not being as hard on yourself when you are fault + in addition to not wrongly blaming yourself when you have no fault) whilst also being more comfortable with guilt (which is easier if you blame yourself less and aren't as hard on yourself, as the guilt isn't as intense)

 

[Duggit]

In his final book,The Divided Mind, Dr. Sarno reported on p. 103 that perfectionism or goodism “was either the predominant factor or a very significant factor” in causing TMS for 94% of his patients. It looks to me, jarditti, like you might be in the goodism category. Sarno also wrote on page 182 that he “routinely advised [his patients] that they need not strive to change their personalities to be successful. . . .One cannot change one’s inherent traits, though they can be consciously modified. For example, the person who feels perpetually compelled to make a doormat of himself and do things for others can take stock and decide to curb the tendency.”

Nothing comes to mind (yet) of being let down in my life in a significant way.

The late John Bowlby propounded an attachment theory that has revolutionized modern child psychology and psychoanalysis. Under that theory, what Sarno called “inherent traits” are actually learned very early in childhood as a coping style to have a safe attachment relationship with one’s primary caregiver(s). The coping style or styles that the child learns, e.g., being a perfectionist or a goodist, then carry forward to his or her personal relationships in adulthood. That is an “inherent trait” in the sense that it is automatically triggered nonconsciously in personal relationships.

Gabor Maté has a succinct discussion of Bowlby's attachment theory in his book The Myth of Normal on pages 104-05. He wrote that evolution has "hard wired into our brains our drive for attachment." That is because "[w]ithout reliable adults moved to take care of us [in infancy], and without our impulse to be close to these caregivers, we simply could not survive--not for a day." Attachment trauma that goes unrepaired by the caregiver is highly significant for an infant.

Maté continued: "[T]he need for attachment does not expire once we're out of diapers: It continues to motivate us throughout our lifespan. . . . What distinguishes our earliest attachment relationships--and crucially the coping styles we develop to maintain them--is that they form the template for how we approach all our significant relationships, long after we have grown out of the do-or-die-phase. We carry them into interactions with spouses, partners, employers, friends, colleagues: into all aspects of our personal, professional, social, and even political lives." (I added the bolding.)

According to modern neuroscience, the human brain is insufficiently developed to create long-term memories prior to age three, and ordinarily one’s relationship coping style or styles are learned before that. If so, we have no memory of the attachment trauma that led to our coping style(s).

My own attachment coping style, which I became aware of with professional help, is a cousin of perfectionism. Just as a fish (so it has been said) does not know it is in water because that is all it has ever known, I have no idea that my cousin of perfectionism is driving my interactions with others in adulthood because that is all I have ever known. That affects almost everything I do everyday, and I am totally unaware of it unless I stop and “take stock” of the particular situation. Once I realize what is going on, I find it is easy to “curb the tendency.” The hard part for me is not curbing the tendency but rather is realizing how pervasively the tendency affects my life.