People aren't always judging

This is just something ive come to realize yesterday night; I know it'll be obvious for some. Ever since I came down with this shit I've just felt like a huge disappointment. I had to kind of make peace with people just thinking 'what a loser' (lol). I dont like to talk about this with people because i just dont like to be this weak failure. Its just when talking to people they dont at all sound judgemental, they just want the best for me. I can hear this in the way they speak. They say they talk about me with others and how bad they feel for me.

I'm projecting a lot of my own negative thoughts onto others. I'm the negative guy that's always judging...

I know I should maybe not care so much about what others think - and i try not to - but i do kind of care. Its just harmful to constantly feel like the village crazy.

I'm starting to feel less pressure about getting better immediately. People arent constantly going out of their way to speak bad about me obviously. I wonder why I have this huge propensity to constantly berate myself. Its harmful, definitely part of the tms problem

 

Love this @Mani! These kind of revelations are healing

"I'm projecting a lot of my own negative thoughts onto others. I'm the negative guy that's always judging..."

A great insight - when you say you're the guy judging, do you mean judging yourself, others or both? I'm curious.

I think you'll always care to some extent, but yes I agree in terms of caring less.

In terms of berating yourself, I think (like pain) it's just another protective mechanism. I think we do it to ourselves because we are so fearful of it from others, we'd rather hear it from ourselves first. This makes it more within our control of course, compared to if it was coming from others (we can control the intensity of it and the frequency). I also think it's a fawning response. If you think about it, someone is less likely to critique you and judge you if you judge yourself first - they might think well he already knows he's a loser so there's no point me telling him (a bully to me is more likely to go after someone who has self-esteem - they are threatened by it and want to tear it down - if the victim admits to the faults the bully is pointing out, it becomes redundant in a sense). Sort of like playing dead in a psychological way! I'll link a Simpsons video I thought of too as a bit of humour, but it kind of relates to what I'm saying.



"I'm starting to feel less pressure about getting better immediately" - Awesome! Perhaps part of the reason for this is because you are (even subconsciously) starting to realise that it's not really about the symptoms - and what you're doing here coming to these revelations (which should hopefully in turn encourage you to treat yourself better) is really what will spur on healing - symptoms will go as a byproduct

 

I too think it is such a great insight. This was touched upon in the quote from Mani and my reply to it on another thread here: https://www.tmswiki.org/forum/threads/bloody-ups-and-downs.33238/page-2#post-169348

 

@BloodMoon @Adam Coloretti (coach)

I see i didnt respond even though it was a great question.

I am not the greatest empathizer. Normal pain triggers didnt bother me and I would have trouble understanding what someone elses distress was about. I have always struggled with feeling my own emotions. I was a thinker always trying to rationalize and actually feeling very little.

I'm adjusting that as I've noticed that my way of living (only thoughts never feelings) wasn't sustainable.

Just as an example, burnout was not something id understand. The entire concept of it was hard for me to grasp. I understand it so much better now, I can totally imagine how helpless these people must feel. I also feel like its just another form of tms. Too much thinking, too little feeling, and the body putting a stop to it. It makes a lot of sense you know. I wish id understood this earlier.

Its gonna be one of the fundamentals of my way of living moving forward: 'listen to the body.'

 

Its funny, I go through these stages. Yesterday I had this relief: I'm not really disappointing everyone, they just want the best for me.

However, I notice that when my tolerance increases, I start dreaming about how my life will be, and feel such an intense desire. I seem to suppress it when im not doing great, but when I get even a smidge better, I just feel like I'll be back in town in 2-3 months. Its possible you know, although the exact return date is unsure and doesnt matter in the grand scheme of things. It might take way longer.

Anyhow, I've been feeling ready to take more risks. I feel ready to give up these imaginary borders my brains bestowed upon me. Its obviously easier said than done, but man i have an intense desire.

I mean I'm a young adult sitting in an attic. Its very unfulfilling in all the ways you can imagine. Yeah mate, I feel ready. We'll see how it goes; I'm excited

 

Brilliant! Love that reflection

 

I completely get that! And I relate to it on my own journey too. I think it's just important to balance the desire with the amount of pressure, in terms of not putting too much pressure on yourself. I've found that excitement and self-judgment can often sit very close to each other! This is especially the case for TMSers, but excitement is great still of course.

Love it! We are right behind you for it

 

This is one of my big big coping mechanisms btw. The idea that someone thinks I did something wrong and that I'm oblivious is one of the most scary things to me. I always mention every embarrassing thing i do because it makes it seem like i own it.

It is one of the more succesful habits cause it makes me come off as very genuine and spontaneous. On the one hand its kind of a socisl skill to be able to mention it, but on the other hand, its just all because im deeply insecure.

I want everyone to know that i knew first.

 

Great awareness, and I agree because I do the same thing!

I get what you mean about it being a social skill, and it does make you seem aware and socially intelligent to an extent. But like you alluded to, at what cost?

This I feel ties back into our chat about authenticity. There's a line between taking appropriate responsibility vs doing something out of insecurity (the first is authentic and the second is simply fear driven).

The fear is always the way out to me, and you identified it well - "The idea that someone thinks I did something wrong and that I'm oblivious is one of the most scary things to me". Then it's. case of can you handle this happening? Can you become comfortable with this occurring? It will hurt at first, but once you're okay with it then you're free. If that sounds a lot like TMS healing and symptoms, then I don't think that's a coincidence!

 

I never ignored anyone's replies to me on these forums, but something that helped me turn a corner in realising that my lack of progress (at the time) didn’t mean I was a “special (hopeless) case” with intractable symptoms (that my mind wasn’t totally convinced were mind/body) was to revisit people’s replies to me that I had really wanted to ignore because they got to me in some way (annoyed me) or I thought they were crap.

Why? Because 9 times out of 10 they went right to the nub of the matter.