The link between job dissatisfaction and TMS

Hi,

I've been pondering this issue for the last few weeks since I've been on the forum, doing the SEP and reading the Wiki and about the unconscious/inner child.

I have the feeling that job dissatisfaction must really enrage the unconscious/inner child.

For instance in my case, my job doesn't match my personal values and interests and it doesn't make use of my strengths, which leads me to have a low level of motivation to grow and develop in this field and causes high stress, especially as there are some very difficult colleagues. I'm basically only in the job because it's a high pay check and good pension. While that is understandable and pragmatic, that must make the unconscious scream right? I can't imagine it cares about pragmatism too much. When thinking about it, it kinda makes me unsurprised that i have so many TMS equivalents.

I did read somewhere that job dissatisfaction was the highest predictor of back pain becoming chronic.

It would be good to read other people's thoughts on this.

 

Very good observation and speculation! TMS is caused by the tension between "what we think we should feel and what we really feel," right? This job issue seems very important to you in your understanding of how/why you have symptoms.

 

I guess it is. I think it's a feeling of knowing deep down that it's not what I want to do with my life, but still carrying on with it because I'm scared to give up the pay check and also scared of how I will react to the stress of changing my line of work and my safe routine that I've built up over the years. The job has caused me huge stress over the last 2 years especially.

 

Yes, yes and yes. When my symptoms were at their worst I was working in the film business... I was a Set Painter "scenic artist' at Paramount (and other studios). I went from entry level to Show Boss in Three years. A lot of the older guys resented me for working my way up the ladder so fast... but...

I hate television and Hollywood. I think that a large majority of our societies ills are direct caused by the media (read Jerry Manders' "Four reasons for the elimination of television") People in my trade got jobs based on Nepotism and Machiavellian power struggles, not on their work. I got busy working hard AND politicking. The reason? It was the highest paying 'trade' job I could get and my family needed the money to maintain the meager bit of social status we had. Never mind that I felt deep down that it was meaningless, I was just a cog in a wheel of a machine I thought was EVIL.

My symptoms resolved before I left Hollywood, BUT It got harder and harder to pretend I cared or wanted to be there. I started working the minimum amount of hours possible and always jumped at the chance to do 'outside' work (regular construction and painting) where I actually felt useful and needed. My salary halved. I moved to Nashville,tn. My wife left me. Now I am just a plain old meat and potatoes 'construction worker'.... and all of my pain is gone and has been for a long time.

Home Run!

 

shakermaker, I'm right there with you. Wanting to do something new but needing to support my family with my current salary, I'm stuck for quite a few more years until retirement, which creates some fear about future symptoms as well. My incongruency is that I'm not helping people, and feel the need to.

 

Add me to the list. My job is okay, but it does nothing to fulfill me. It is nothing that I dreamed of or thought I'd be doing 30 years ago when I graduated college. In fact, it's probably the last thing I thought I'd be doing.

More importantly, I think, is the pressure to keep it to support my family (5 of us plus more animals than I want to admit), combined with the fact that no one seems to understand that pressure, is quite maddening consciously, and probably even more so unconsciously.

Which brings us to dreams deferred, or forgotten. Guilt. Sadness. Embarrassment. Let it go, let it go...

 

Thank you Jan! I don't feel I'm comparing. I feel I've done all the things you list, but still having some issues - or maybe it's just taking a long time. According to Steve O's book, because I have tinnitus, I'm still not listening to myself somehow, and I can't figure out what that is to get rid of it. I've been journaling emotions for quite some time. I'm ready to start punching a bag. Things are a whole lot better, but still ever-present. I don't know if I'm missing the right emotion to address, or what. I guess my limbic system is doing a good job hiding it from me even though I ask/demand more info regularly. Regardless, thank you for those thoughts!!

 

Thanks Jan! I can do that. I sometimes feel like I'm lost in the matrix with this stuff and missing something obvious that my brain is hiding from me. I don't think my fearful brain is much in control, but maybe a tiny bit still...I have great ability to take control, and have - I just feel limited by my work, which I think is keeping me stagnant. Are you saying I (we) need to work hard to convince the subconscious that it's ok to be in a job that isn't in line with my goals?

 

This is great stuff, thanks Jan. I guess most of it is just subconscious because there's not a lot coming to my conscious mind - I will go through the questions in detail, but at first look I haven't failed anyone's expectations at work other than maybe my own for slacking just occasionally, which everyone does. I do not have a lot of social time at work, most of the time I'm just stuck alone in my office (which may be one of the issues). The only thing I can think of is that I'm not really helping people with anything lasting (just quick/silly computer problems), otherwise I'm in a very technical job and I don't get to see the results of my work. It's also a Government job and people are extremely negative at the office, and I'm an empath. I have learned to deal with them through journaling and seeing that the reason they are that way is their past. I appreciate your help and know that you're not expecting me to answer these questions for you, but for me, so will keep working on them!

 

I wish there was a 'triple like' button for That JanAtheCPA.

I have worked on stage again since my cure. I just have to remind myself deep down I don't give a care about celebrity, ascendancy and power.
. I just keep my head down , do my work and have a lot of 'happy' dialogue about how nice it is I have found the way out. I don't rail against or complain... just know that I am working for a higher order that I don't understand.

There isn't anything I CAN'T do because of TMS. However, the awareness that I received that cured it has vastly changed my interests .

 

I second that, Jan is on a roll today

 

Hi All,

To me, both of these passages point to how we let our superegos --Inner Critics, and our superego ideals ---who we think we need to be in order to be OK, run us. So your work Jan points to a healthy separation or what I call "inner boundaries" between you and the scripts which try to run you. When we "don't give a f*ck," this is a doorway to freedom and autonomy. With this comes clarity and reality as the author suggests. We untangle ourselves from the efforting to be somebody we aren't, and probably never were.

In my experience this takes deep work with the superego, because its job is to keep us in a deficient, distracted, striving state, in which we never arrive, we're never good enough. It is attempting to improve us so that we'll be lovable. In terms of work, this might mean "being enough."

Eventually the natural question arises: If I am not that thing I thought I was, or can never be this thing which I am trying to be, then what am I? This not-knowing is part of what the superego does not want to allow into consciousness, which also explains the vehemence of its activity. And yet with not-knowing, tenderness, compassion, vulnerability and love can live. This beats striving and never arriving! For me, this boundary making is a life-time's work, going through the doorway into not-knowing many times. It is not so easy for a perfectionist people-pleaser!

Andy B

 

I think this is important and beautiful! You know this Baseball65, but I want to note it.

 

Thank you, Jan. I guess this is a tricky one. When I say I haven't failed anyone, I was answering your question directly, but perhaps that's not exactly what you meant.

There is no one from my past who has ever judged me that I know of, everyone is proud of the work I do, all parents family friends etc. I get paid well enough (my wife makes more than me to be honest, and I am secure in that) and have been at this job for 18 years but I do like some change. I *could* leave and get by but am not qualified to do anything else that I can think of that would give me more pleasure. I think it IS just me doing the judging, I just don't know why. Part of this may be that when I got very sick, it was due to a house flood issue - and during that time, I was embarrassed at work because I had to go to a different building due to chemical smells being a problem (I'm back now, and it didn't really phase anyone other than me) During that time I did keep telling myself I would have to find a new job because I felt guilt that I couldn't be in the proper building to do my work. Could I have programmed all this and that's why I'm still having issues? Really the bigger issue for me was the smells. And now that I've healed a lot after 18 months, I realize I have a lot of normal life-stress stuff contributing (giving my 3 kids rides to sports every day and managing my wife's office as a 2nd job) I have journaled about all this a LOT and will continue. I really appreciate your time & generosity, Jan!! You seem to be very wise with all this! Also I want to apologize for hijacking the original poster's thread I hope that the discussion has helped them as well and would love to hear more detail about their situation if they wish.